THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


7 


di- 


NEIGHBOURS 


BY 

WILFRID  WILSON  GIBSON 

Livelihood 

Hill  Tracks 

womenkind 

Daily  Bread 

Collected  Poems 

Battle  and  Other  Poems 

Borderlands  and  Thoroughfares 


NEIGHBOURS 


BY 

WILFRID  WILSON  GIBSON 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
1920 

All  rifihts  reserved 


Copyright,  1920, 
By  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.     Published  September,  1920. 


TO 
MICHAEL 


Brief  songs  of  these  distracted  days 
I  dedicate  to  you 
In  whose  clear  undistracted  gaze 
Old  Eden  blooms  anew  — 

That,  when  beset  by  hopes  and  fears 
Which  life  yet  hides  from  you, 
You'll  think  of  me  in  after  years 
And  find  my  singing  true. 


I    ;21G2 


NEIGHBOURS 

ROBERT  AND  ELEANOR  ASKEW 

What  do  you  listen  for? 

I  hardly  know, 
Unless  my  heart  is  hearkening  for  the  flow 
Of  Tarras  Water,  singing  by  the  door 
Of  Kirdlestead.     I've  never  lived  before 
So  far  from  running  water  in  my  life. 
The  quiet  frightens  me. 

The  quiet,  wife? 
You  never  heard  the  tramp  of  passing  feet 
Or  rumble  of  wheels  at  Kirdlestead.     This  street 
Is  quiet  enough ;  but  surely  Kirdlestead 
Was  quieter? 

I've  never  lain  in  bed 
Without  the  voice  of  water  calling  clear, 
Save  when  the  West  wind  drowned  it,  in  my  ear; 
And  now  I  cannot  sleep :  the  darkness  lies 

[I] 


NEIGHBOURS 

Heavily  as  a  deadweight  on  my  eyes, 

As  though  I  lay  deep-buried  underground 

With  ears  that  strained  to  catch  the  faintest  sound 

Of  wind  in  grass  or  water  over  stones : 

The  silence  steals  like  ice  into  my  bones 

And  numbs  my  body,  freezing  blood  and  breath 

Till  my  heart  flutters  in  the  clutch  of  death. 

And  you  can  talk  of  death,  a  new-made  bride, 
Lying  the  first  night  by  your  husband's  side? 

The  husband  that  my  father  pledged  me  to 
With  his  last  dying  breath !     The  dead  and  you 
Have  held  me  to  my  troth :  and  I'm  the  wife 
Of  my  dead  father's  faithful  friend  for  life  — 
For  life  that  now  I  know  can  never  be 
The  song  that  Tarras  Water  sang  to  me. 


[2] 


CELIA  AND  SYLVIA  WARDEN 

What  is  that  tapping?     There  it  is  again! 

A  spray  of  roses  blown  against  the  pane  — 
Thorns  scratching  and  a  softly-thudding  bloom. 

It's  strange  as  we  mope  here  in  this  prim  room 
Yawning  for  bedtime  in  the  cold  lamplight, 
To  think  of  roses  blowing  in  the  night, 
And  just  that  thin  glass  shutting  them  outside. 
Oh,  how  I  long  to  fling  the  windows  wide ! 

Roses  and  thorns! 

Ay,  thorns,  too,  if  need  be! 
Rather  than  hear  them  tap  incessantly 
The  cold  glass  that  shuts  in  my  heart,  I'd  bare 
My  bosom  for  the  sharpest  thorns  to  tear. 


[3l 


JOHN  AND  MARGARET 
NETHERTON 

Why  do  you  strike  a  match  ? 

I  want  to  see 
What  time  it  is,  wife. 

It  is  nearly  three. 

How  do  you  know  that,  wife,  without  a  light? 

I  know. 

You  know?     Well,  sure  enough,  you're  right. 

I  cannot  think  .  .  . 

You  don't  remember,  then  ? 

Remember,  wife? 

The  memories  of  men ! 
But,  husband,  as  it  seems  you  don't  recall, 
What  makes  you  want  to  know  the  time  at  all  ? 

I  couldn't  say,  wife:  but  I  cannot  get 
A  wink  of  sleep  —  as  if  my  eyes  were  set 
On  something  that  they  cannot  see  quite  clear : 

[4] 


NEIGHBOURS 

My  thoughts  keep  fumbling  something  very  near 
That  yet  eludes  them  always.     And  just  now 
I  felt  that,  rest  or  no  rest,  anyhow, 
I  must  know  what  o'clock  it  was.     But  you  — 
I  cannot  think,  wife,  how  it  was  you  knew 
Almost  the  very  moment  .  .  . 

T  was  nigh  three 
A  year  ago  that  he  smiled  up  at  me ; 
And  as  within  my  arms  he  lay  so  still 
I  felt  his  body  stiffen  and  grow  chill 
Against  my  bosom :  and  how  should  my  breast 
Forget  the  moment  when  his  heart  found  rest? 


[51 


OLIVER  AND  URSULA  REED 

It's  useless,  wife,  to  turn  it  up :  the  oil 
Is  done,  and  you'll  just  char  the  wick. 

The  toil 
Lamps  take  to  keep  them  going !     It's  not  long 
Since  last  I  filled  it.     Surely  something's  wrong 
With  a  lamp  that  burns  so  quickly. 

Ay  .  .  .  the  light 
We  thought  would  burn  a  lifetime,  in  one  night 
Consumed  its  fuel  in  a  wild  flare,  and  we 
Are  left  a  charred  wick,  smouldering  smokily, 
To  work  by  till,  at  last,  a  dull  red  spark, 
It  shall  wink  out  and  leave  us  in  the  dark. 


[6] 


BARBARA  FELL 

Stephen,  wake  up!     There's  someone  at  the  gate. 

Quick,  to  the  window.  .  .  .  Oh,  you'll  be  too  late! 

I  hear  the  front  door  opening  quietly. 

Did  you  forget  last  night  to  turn  the  key? 

A  foot  is  on  the  stairs  —  nay,  just  outside 

The  very  room  —  the  door  is  opening  wide.  .  .  . 

Stephen,     wake     up!     Wake    up!     Who's     there? 

Who's  there  ? 
I  only  feel  a  cold  wind  in  my  hair.  .   .  . 
Have  I  been  dreaming,  Stephen?     Husband,  wake 
And  comfort  me:  I  think  my  heart  will  break. 
I  never  knew  you  sleep  so  sound  and  still.  .  .  . 
O  my  heart's  love,  why  is  your  hand  so  chill  ? 


[7] 


KATHERINE  WEIR 

Though  I  have  been  a  none-too-happy  wife, 

And  now  my  children  grow  away  from  me, 

Bringing  to  old  age  fresh  anxiety, 

I  have  been  used ;  and  to  be  used  by  life, 

Even  ill-used  and  broken  utterly 

With  every  faith  betrayed  and  trust  abused, 

Is  a  kinder  lot  than  in  security 

To  crumble  coldly  to  the  grave,  unused. 


[8] 


ESTHER  MILBURN 

Once  realised,  what  else  was  left  to  do 

But  part  and  go  our  separate  ways  anew  ? 

I've  not  set  eyes  upon  him  since  that  night. 

Why  did  we  marry  ?     Why  did  that  paper  light 

I  held  the  match  to  ?     Yes,  it's  gone  black  out, 

Leaving  the  sticks  unkindled,  and  no  doubt 

The  fire  must  be  relaid  before  't  will  burn. 

But  when  love  fails  there  is  no  second  turn. 

If  once  the  paper  doesn't  fire  the  wood, 

Or  the  blazing  wood,  the  coal,  there's  little  good 

In  striking  matches  to  eternity : 

They  only  spurt  and  flicker  mockingly, 

Scorching  the  fingers,  to  illuminate 

Charred  litter  in  the  cold  bars  of  the  grate. 


[9] 


PHILIP  AND  PHOEBE  WARE 

Who  is  that  woman,  Philip,  standing  there 
Before  the  mirror  doing  up  her  hair? 

You're  dreaming,  Phoebe,  or  the  morning  light 
Mixing  and  mingling  with  the  dying  night 
Makes  shapes  out  of  the  darkness,  and  you  see 
Some  dream-remembered  phantasy  maybe. 

Yet,  it  grows  clearer  with  the  growing  day ; 
And  in  the  cold  dawnlight  her  hair  is  grey : 
Her  lifted  arms  are  naught  but  bone  :  her  hands 
Are  lean  as  claws,  as,  fumbling  long,  she  stands 
Trying  to  pin  that  wisp  into  its  place. 
O  Philip,  I  must  look  upon  her  face 
There  in  the  mirror.     Nay,  but  I  will  rise 
And  peep  over  her  shoulder  .  .  .  Oh,  the  eyes 
That  burn  out  from  that  face  of  skin  and  bone 
Searching  my  very  marrow  are  my  own ! 


[10] 


ANDREW  AND  ANN  HEATHER- 

INGTON 

What  are  you  thinking  of  so  seriously? 
My  birthday,  Ann. 

Your  birthday  ?     Mercy  me, 
I'd  quite  forgotten  that  it  falls  to-day ! 

What  matter,  wife?     Birthdays  as  one  grows  grey 
Are  scarce  the  anniversaries  of  joy 
They  once  were. 

I  can't  picture  you,  a  boy. 
Your  hair's  no  greyer  now  than  when  we  met 
The  first  time,  just  a  year  ago :  and  yet 
You  did  not  think  yourself  too  grey  to  wed 
A  girl  just  fresh  from  school. 

And  her  gold  head 
Seemingly  didn't  think  itself  too  young 
To  marry  grizzled  locks? 

A  golden  tongue 
Had  more  to  do  with  it  than  silver  hairs. 

[ii] 


NEIGHBOURS 

But  you,  you  came  upon  me  unawares 
Before  I'd  realised  what  life  might  be, 
Before  I  knew  what  it  might  mean  to  me. 

Though  you  were  old  enough  to  be  more  wise.  .  . 

Yet  not  too  old  to  be  dazzled  by  your  eyes ! 
My  heart  was  young  enough  .  .  . 

At  fifty-nine ! 

Ay,  and  still  loves  to  see  your  blue  eyes  shine 
Even  though  anger  fire  them. 

Then  it's  true 
Years  count  for  naught.     I'm  older  far  than  you. 
Your  heart's  a  boy's  heart  still :  but  mine's  as  old 
As  any  woman's  heart  whose  tale  is  told. 
Though  you  were  forty  years  of  age,  a  man 
Halfway  through  life  before  my  life  began, 
I  have  outstripped  you  in  a  single  year, 
And  have  naught  left  to  hope  for  or  to  fear. 


[12] 


REBECCA  NIXON  AND  MARTHA 

WAUGH 

If  your  clock's  going  at  all,  it  must  be  slow. 
Surely,  it's  stopped? 

It  stopped  a  week  ago. 

A  week  ago  —  and  you  have  let  it  stand  ? 

I  hadn't  the  heart  to  wind  it  up.     No  hand 

But  Ben's  has  turned  the  key  since  he,  himself, 

Put  the  clock  there  upon  the  mantelshelf 

The  day  that  we  came  home  for  the  first  time 

To  set  up  house  together :  and  its  chime 

Had  never  failed  to  sound  an  hour  since  then, 

Unless  he  had  it  down  to  clean  ;  for  Ben 

Was  handy  and  could  always  overhaul 

A  clock,  though  it  was  not  his  trade  at  all, 

As  well  as  any  watchmaker.     His  heart 

Doted  on  wheels :  he'd  handle  every  part 

So  daintily  that  you  could  never  guess 

His  job  was  hewing  coal.     I  must  confess 

Wheels  always  daunted  me :  but  Ben's  brain  went 

By  clockwork ;  and  his  happiest  hours  were  spent 

[13] 


NEIGHBOURS 

Sorting  old  clocks  and  trying  to  make  them  go. 
And  that  one's  never  been  a  second  slow 
In  all  these  years  or  half-a-second  fast, 
Or  failed  to  strike  .  .  .  until  Ben  breathed  his  last 
On  Monday  morn  before  the  stroke  of  three  .  .  . 
Though  all  the  town's  clocks  hammered  presently 
As  if  they  struck  my  heart  .  .  .  Ben  always  wound 
That  clock  each  Sunday ;  but  when  the  last  came 

round 
He'd  been  in  bed  a  week,  and  his  poor  mind 
Was  wandering  —  though  his  fingers  tried  to  wind 
Some  ghostly  clock  that  troubled  him  all  night  — 
And  when  I  stole  downstairs  and  struck  a  light, 
I  missed  the  tick ;  and  with  a  still  white  face 
Ben's  clock  was  standing  silent  in  its  place 
With  motionless  hands  just  on  the  stroke  of  three. 
Its   heart   had   stopped   when    Ben's   stopped.     As, 

for  me 
I'll  never  wind  it  up  again :  I  know 
Even  if  I  cared,  no  touch  could  make  it  go 
But  Ben's :  and  those  still  hands  will  always  keep 
My  heart  in  mind  .  .  . 

Nay,  Martha,  you  need  sleep. 
You  mustn't  brood  like  this.     Try  to  forget. 
Come,  let  me  wind  it  up  for  you  and  set 
The  old  clock  going.     Only  think  how  Ben 
Would  hate  to  have  it  standing. 

[14] 


NEIGHBOURS 

Wind  it  then. 
Ben  hated  a  stopped  clock :  and  now  he's  gone, 
It  seems  I've  got  to  keep  things  going  on. 


[I5l 


WILLIAM  AND  AGNES  PRINGLE 

You've  locked  the  doors  and  snecked  the  windows 
tight  ? 

I've  locked  up  as  I've  locked  up  every  night 
Since  father  crept  that  last  time  painfully 
Upstairs  and  left  the  locking-up  to  me  — 
Since  for  the  last  time  father  went  to  bed 
To  rise  no  more.     To  think  that  he's  been  dead 
Just  twenty  years  —  ay,  to  the  very  hour ! 
The  clock  was  striking  in  the  Abbey  tower 
When  he  sat  up.     "Are  all  the  windows  fast?" 
He  whispered,  then  dropped  back  and  breathed  his 

last. 
To  think  I'd  nigh  forgotten! 

Ay,  to-day, 
Your  thoughts  have  all  been  turned  a  different  way. 

True,  lass :  and  yet  it's  queer  I  should  forget. 

Queer,    that    a    bridegroom's    thoughts    should   not 

be  set 
On  death? 

[16] 


NEIGHBOURS 

Nay,  queer  I  didn't  choose  instead 
A  different  day  in  all  the  year  to  wed. 

Ay  —  but  you've  not  forgotten  to  secure 

The  doors  and  windows :  so  you  may  feel  sure 

While  such  important  things  you  think  of  still 

Your  mind's  not  getting  over-flighty,  Will. 

But  you  must  never  let  a  harebrained  wife 

Divert  you  from  the  habits  of  a  life. 

Yet,  here's  just  one  thing,  Will,  that  puzzles  me : 

What  is  it  you  lock  out  so  carefully  — 

That  you've  locked  out  each  night  these  twenty  years, 

And  your  old  father  with  his  anxious  fears 

Locked  out  before  you,  and  his  father,  too, 

As  likely  as  not,  before  him?     Why  should  you 

Secure  yourself  against  the  harmless  night? 

I  never  looked  upon  it  in  that  light  — 
But  it's  the  custom  .  .  . 

What  is  it  that  you  dread 
Will  come  upon  you  as  you  lie  in  bed, 
If  you  should  leave  a  window  or  a  door 
Unfastened  ? 

Well,  I  hardly  know,  I'm  sure! 

[17] 


NEIGHBOURS 

No  bolt  or  bar  has  ever  locked  out  death : 

So  your  old  father  might  have  spared  his  breath. 

Or  is  it,  rather,  something  you  lock  in 

Each  night,  lest  thieves  .  .  . 

There's  naught  for  thieves  to  win; 
Though  I  had  left  the  doors  and  windows  wide 
These  many  years  .  .  . 

But  then,  you'd  no  young  bride. 
And  now,  I  wonder  if  you  know  aright 
Or  realise  what  you  lock  in  to-night  ? 


[18] 


NICHOLAS  HALL 

Well,  who  are  you?     And  how  did  you  come  there? 

I  must  have  nodded,  drowsing  in  my  chair, 

Although  I  could  have  sworn  I  hadn't  slept 

Or  even  winked  an  eyelid,  but  had  kept 

My  eyes  set  steadily  upon  the  glow, 

Dreaming  of  fires  burnt  out  so  long  ago  — 

Ay,  long  ago !     But  you,  when  did  you  come  ? 

Why  do  you  stand  there,  smiling,  keeping  mum  ? 

I  felt  no  draught  blow  from  the  opening  door, 

And  heard  no  footstep  on  the  sanded  floor. 

Wrhy  don't  you  speak,  young  man  ?  —  for  you  are 

young  — 
That  much  I  see  —  and  surely  you've  a  tongue? 
And  young  men  should  be  civil  to  old  men. 
What,  you  won't  answer  ?     Please  to  leave  me,  then, 
To  my  own  hearthside :  please  to  go  away. 
You'll  be  an  old  man,  too,  yourself,  some  day; 
And  you'll  be  sorry  then,  you  will,  my  son, 
To  think  you  stood  there  grinning,  making  fun 
Of  an  old  man's  afflictions,  an  old  man 
Who  once  was  young,  too,  when  the  quick  blood 

ran  .  .  . 
But  who  you  are,  I  can't  make  out  at  all. 

[19] 


NEIGHBOURS 

Why  do  you  cast  no  shadow  on  the  wall 
While  the  high  chair  you  lean  against  throws  back 
A  shadow  on  the  whitewash  sharp  and  black? 
There's  something  half-familiar,  now  the  flame 
Lights  up  your   face  —  something  that   when  you 

came 
Was    passing   through    my   mind  ...  I    can't    re- 
call .  .  . 
Ah  God,  what's  happening  to  Nicholas  Hall 
When  he  can  see  his  young  self  standing  there 
Mocking  his  old  self  huddled  in  a  chair! 


[20] 


BLIND  BELL 

Like  a  wind-writhen  ash 
On  a  rime-grizzled  moor, 
Corpse-cold  in  the  shade 
Beside  the  church-door, 

She  stood  with  a  grin 
As  we  trod,  newly-wed, 
The  slimy  green  path 
By  the  mounds  of  the  dead. 

As  her  blank  eyes  bleared  out 
From  the  pocked  yellow  face 
Like  a  moon  on  the  wane, 
We  slackened  our  pace. 

As  her  cruel  blind  eyes 
Peered  into  each  heart, 
We  faltered  and  trailed 
Unlinked  and  apart 

Till  estranged  and  corpse-cold 
We  stood  at  our  door, 
Each  lone  as  an  ash 
On  a  rime-grizzled  moor. 

[21] 


ELLEN  CHESTER 

After  working  all  day  at  the  tanpits, 
With  strong  hands  tanned  horny  and  hard 
And  stained  by  the  bark  brown  as  leather 
He  would  come  every  night  from  the  yard. 

And  I  from  my  work  at  the  laundry, 
With  hands  soused  in  suds  clean  and  white 
And  soft  to  the  touch  as  old  linen 
Would  meet  him  halfway  every  night : 

I'd  meet  him  halfway  every  evening, 
Though  always  I  shuddered  to  feel 
Those  hard  fingers  gripping  my  fingers 
And  crushing  my  soft  hands  like  steel. 

But  now  I'm  forgot  and  forsaken; 
And  eagerly  waiting  he  stands 
For  a  girl  coming  home  from  the  gardens 
With  weathered  and  grubby  red  hands. 

As  unseen  in  the  dark  of  a  doorway 
I  watch  him  alone  and  apart, 
My  cold  fingers  fumble  my  bosom 
To  loosen  his  clutch  from  mv  heart. 

[22] 


RICHARD  KENDAL 

I  could  not  sleep  for  aching  cold", 

And  as  I  turned  and  tossed 

I  muttered :     This  sharp  snap  will  mean 

Money  and  labour  lost : 

My  currant-bushes,  newly-bought, 

Will  all  be  killed  by  frost. 

The  bushes  I've  saved  up  to  buy, 

And  with  back-breaking  toil 

Have  set  with  roots  spread  carefully 

In  the  well-watered  soil 

Are  just  an  acre  of  innocents 

For  early  frost  to  spoil. 

Though  every  bush  survived  the  cold 

To  pay  me  royally, 

The  breaking  of  the  morrow's  morn 

Brought  bitter  news  to  me; 

For  in  the  night  my  oldest  friend 

Had  perished,  drowned  at  sea. 

In  drowning  darkness,  icy-chill, 
My  oldest  friend  was  lost ; 

[*3l 


NEIGHBOURS 

Yet  never  once  I'd  thought  of  him 
As  fretfully  I  tost, 

Concerned  lest  my  new  currant-trees 
Should  suffer  from  the  frost. 


[24] 


BETTY  RIDDLE 

As  she  sits  at  her  stall  in  the  Martinmas  Fair 

With  a  patched  blue  umbrella  slung  over  her  chair, 

Old  Betty  Riddle  sells 

Green  jacks  and  jargonels, 

Fixing  some  ghost  of  old  days  with  her  stare. 

"  A  ha'p'orth  of  greenjacks !  "  each  little  boy  cries, 

Devouring  six-pen'orth  at  least  with  his  eyes : 

Into  his  grubby  hands 

Pears  drop  as  still  he  stands ; 

But  she  gives  him  no  glance  as  he  munches  his  prize. 

While  mumbling  and  mowing  she  broods  all  the  day, 

And  her  mellow  green  pyramids  dwindle  away, 

Folk  in  the  roundabout 

Racket  and  skirl  and  shout; 

Yet  never  a  word  to  it  all  does  she  say. 

And  even  if,  when  her  whole  stock-in-trade's  bought, 
Some  laughing  lad's  eye  by  that  cold  stare  is  caught, 
Glumly  away  he'll  slink 
Too  dull  of  wit  to  think 
Of  offering  a  penny  to  her  for  her  thought. 

[25] 


NEIGHBOURS 

And  soon  they  forget  her,  the  lads  without  sense ; 
Yet  the  thought  that  is  burning  that  blue  and  intense 
Past-piercing  steely  eye, 
Blind  to  the  passer-by, 

Must  be  worth  a  deal  more  than  the  pears  and  the 
pence. 

Still  staring  she  sits  as  the  slow  quarters  chime 
Till  the  raw  fog  has  covered  her  bare  boards  with 

rime  — 
Crazy  old  wife  who  sells 
Green  jacks  and  jargonels  — 
Having  buried  three  husbands  in  all  in  her  time. 


[26] 


BESSIE  STOKOE 

He  stood  with  the  other  young  herds 

At  the  Hiring  to-day : 

And  I  laughed  and  I  chaffed  and  changed  words 

With  every  young  hind  of  them  all 

As  I  stopped  by  the  lollipop  stall, 

But  never  a  word  would  he  say. 

He  had  straggly  long  straw-coloured  hair 

And  a  beard  like  a  goat  — 

In  his  breeches  a  badly-stitched  tear 

That  I  longed,  standing  there  in  the  crush, 

To  re-mend,  as  I  hankered  to  brush 

The  ruddle  and  fluff  from  his  coat. 

But  his  bonnie  blue  eyes  staring  wide 
Looked  far  beyond  me, 
As  though  on  some  distant  fellside 
His  dogs  were  collecting  the  sheep, 
And  he  anxiously  watched  them  to  keep 
A  young  dog  from  running  too  free  — 

And  I  almost  expected  to  hear 
From  the  lips  of  the  lad 

[27] 


NEIGHBOURS 

A  shrill  whistle  sing  in  my  ear 

As  he  eyed  the  green  hillside  to  check 

The  fussy  black  frolicking  speck 

That  was  chasing  the  grey  specks  like  mad  . 

So  I  left  them,  and  went  on  my  way 

With  a  lad  with  black  hair; 

And  we  swung  and  rode  round  all  the  day 

To  the  racket  of  corncrake  and  gong: 

But  I  never  forgot  in  the  throng 

The  eyes  with  the  far-away  stare. 

The  jimmy-smart  groom  at  my  side 

Had  twinkling  black  eyes; 

But  the  grin  on  his  mouth  was  too  wide, 

And  his  hands  with  my  hands  were  too  free 

So  I  took  care  to  slip  him  at  tea 

As  he  turned  round  to  pay  for  the  pies, 

And  I  left  him  alone  on  the  seat 
With  the  teapot  and  cups 
And  the  two  pies  he'd  paid  for  to  eat. 
If  he  happens  to  guess  at  the  cause, 
It  may  teach  him  to  keep  his  red  paws 
For  the  handling  of  horses  and  pups. 

But  alone  in  the  rain  and  the  dark 
As  I  made  for  the  farm 

[28] 


NEIGHBOURS 

I  halted  a  moment  to  hark 
To  the  sound  of  a  shepherd's  long  stride : 
And  the  shy  lad  stepped  up  to  my  side, 
And  I  felt  his  arm  link  through  my  arm. 

So  it  seems  after  all  I'm  to  mend 
Those  breeches,  and  keep 
That  shaggy  head  clipped  to  the  end, 
And  the  shaggy  chin  clean,  and  to  give 
That  coat  a  good  brush  —  and  to  live 
All  my  days  in  the  odour  of  sheep. 


[29] 


AGATHA  TODD 

Young  lads  tramping,  fifes  and  drums 
Down  the  street  the  hubbub  comes  : 

And  the  drumsticks  drub  again 
On  my  stretched  and  aching  brain ; 

While  the  screeching  of  the  fife 
Just  goes  through  me  like  a  knife. 

Yet  I  thought  the  music  gay 
When  Dick  Lishman  marched  away; 

And  I  laughed ;  for  what  was  he 
But  a  lad  who  bothered  me  — 

But  a  man  of  many  men 
I  had  little  need  of  then? 

Now  I  know  that  if  the  fife 

Cut  my  heart-strings  like  a  knife, 

Rattling  drumsticks,  rub-a-dub, 
On  my  coffin-lid  would  drub; 
[3o] 


NEIGHBOURS 

And  my  heart  would  never  rest 
In  the  hollow  of  my  breast, 

But  wrould  always  start  and  beat 
To  the  tramping  of  dead  feet. 


[3i] 


RALPH  LILBURN 

The  night  we  took  the  bees  out  to  the  heather, 
The  sealed  hives  stacked  behind  us,  as  together 
We  rode  in  the  jingly  jolting  cart,  were  humming 
Like  the  far-murmuring  rumour  of  blown  branches. 

White  in  the  moonflame  was  the  flowering  heather 

And  white  the  sandy  trackway,  as  together 

We  travelled,  and  a  dewy  scent  of  honey 

Hung  in  the  warm  white  windless  air  of  midnight. 

A  silvery  trackway  through  moon-silvered  heather 
To  the  humming  dark  of  the  hives  we'll  ride  together 
For  evermore  through  the  murmurous  dewy  mid- 
night, 
My  heart,  a  hive  of  honey-scented  moonlight. 


[32] 


OLIVER  GARTH 

Cold  as  mushrooms  are  her  hands, 
Cold  and  white, 
As  she  awaits  me  in  the  night 
Where  St.  Michael's  steeple  stands. 

Cold  as  mushrooms  are  her  lips 
In  the  dew 

Kissing  mine  beneath  the  yew 
As  within  my  arm  she  slips. 

And  I  learn  naught  from  her  cold 
Lightless  eyes 

Of  her  daydreams  as  she  lies 
Underneath  the  heavy  mould. 

Once  her  hands  were  brown  as  mine 

When  we  stood 

In  the  little  rowan-wood 

By  the  waters  of  the  Tyne, 

And  her  parted  lips  were  bright 
And  as  red 

As  the  berries  overhead 
In  the  still  October  light. 
[331 


NEIGHBOURS 

And  I  promised  I'd  be  true 
To  her  there  .  .  . 
And  the  rowan-trees  are  bare  . 
And  we  meet  beneath  the  yew. 


[34] 


HENRY  TURNBULL 

He  planked  down  sixpence,  and  he  took  his  drink, 

Then  slowly  picked  the  change  up  from  the  zinc, 

And  in  his  breeches'  pocket  buttoned  tight 

Two  greasy  coppers  which  that  very  night 

Were  used  by  Betty  Catchiside,  called  in 

To  lay  him  out,  when  she'd  tied  up  his  chin, 

To  keep  his  eyelids  shut:  and  so  he  lies 

With  twopence  change  till  doomsday  on  his  eyes. 


[35] 


SAM  HOGARTH 

He  sits  —  his  Bible  open  on  his  knee, 
Nell,  his  old  whippet,  curled  up  at  his  feet  — 
Muttering  at  whiles  and  nodding  drowsily 
Over  the  damped  slack-fire  that  dully  burns 
In  the  little  grate :  then  shifting  in  his  seat 
He  lifts  the  book  with  shaky  hands,  his  head 
Wagging  with  eagerness,  and  fumbling  turns 
From  the  tenth  chapter  of  Genesis,  unread, 
To  the  well-thumbed  flyleaf  at  the  back,  to  pore 
With  spectacled  weak  reverent  eyes  once  more, 
Lest  it  escape  his  failing  memory, 
On  Nell's  proud  scrawl-recorded  pedigree. 


[36] 


JAUNTY  JACK 

He'd  run  like  a  cat  on  the  ridge  of  the  roof, 
And  then  to  give  proof 

Of  his  daredevil  wit  he  would  stumble  and  slip 
Down  the  slant  of  the  slates  and  over  the  side  — 
While   agape  we  would    fear   for  the  end  of  his 

slide  — 
But  just  as  he  seemed  to  shoot  over  the  edge 
His  fingers  would  grip 
The  lip  of  the  gutter  or  maybe  the  ledge 
Of  a  top-storey  window;  and  so  he'd  hang  there 
Cockadoodling  and  kicking  his  heels  in  the  air. 

And  then  he'd  swing  on  to  the  ladder  and  pant 

Up  the  slippery  slant, 

And  take  up  his  trowel  and  hawk  of  wet  lime, 

Going  quietly  on  with  the  job  he  was  at 

With  the  same  solemn  face  and  sly  rake  of  the  hat 

As  though  he  had  worked  without  stopping  to  wink 

The  whole  of  the  time, 

So  sober  and  smug  that  a  newcomer'd  think 

That  never  a  notion  at  all  he  had  got 

That  wasn't  concerned  with  the  new  chimney-pot. 


[37] 


NEIGHBOURS 

And  no  one  could  guess  he  was  wedded  for  life 

To  a  slut  of  a  wife, 

And  had  five  gaping  lasses  and  five  gaping  boys 

To  feed  and  to  clothe  and  to  keep  in  shoeleather, 

And  to  scrub  every  Saturday  night  all  together 

At  the  scullery  tap  with  a  splash-dash  and  squall 

And  the  hell  of  a  noise. 

Then  one  dark  Winter  morning  his  pride  had  a 

fall  — 
Tripped  over  his  shadow  and  headlong  downstairs, 
And  ended  his  jests  and  his  lardy-da  airs. 


[38] 


MICHAEL  DODD 

When  the  folding-star  had  kindled 
In  the  embers  of  the  West, 
And  the  happy  day  was  over, 
Quietly  we  sank  to  rest 

Thinking  we  should  sleep  till  daybreak ; 
But  we  wakened  all  too  soon 
As  above  the  ridge  of  Hareshaw 
Stole  the  cold  white  witches'  moon  — 

Stole  the  icy  moon  and  held  us 
Tranced  as  we  with  numb  surprise 
Saw  the  cold  estranging  glitter 
Of  each  other's  alien  eyes. 


[39l 


MARTHA  CAFFREY 

It  must  have  been  his  name  that  stirred 
My  mind  from  slumber  none  too  deep, 
As,  waking  in  the  night  I  heard 
My  sister  talking  in  her  sleep. 

I  could  not  catch  what  else  she  said 
As  I  lay  there  with  heart  aflame, 
Thinking  about  the  newly-dead, 
Wondering  why  she  should  breathe  his  name 

Why  she  should  dream  of  him  who  lay 
Scarce  colder  in  the  grave  than  he, 
Since  our  unlucky  wedding-day, 
Had  ever  shown  himself  to  me. 


[40] 


MARGARET  DEAN 

When  we  broke  in  the  lamp  was  burning  still 
With  clear  and  steady  light 
Although  the  noonday  blazed  on  heath  and  hill, 
But  in  her  eyes  was  night. 

Their  flame  that  had  out-braved  the  stress  and  care 

Of  hope  and  fear  and  doubt 

In  the  long  quiet  of  the  last  despair 

Had  gently  flickered  out. 


Ui] 


PHOEBE  ELLIS 

The  little  bell  still  sounds  as  true  and  clear 
As  when  she  rang  it,  standing  at  the  door ; 
And  still  the  happy  children  when  they  hear 
Run  in  from  play,  though  she  will  ring  no  more. 

But  whether  they  remember,  as  they  storm 
The  threshold,  who  once  rang  it,  none  can  tell, 
Or  if  for  them  each  night  her  ghostly  form 
From  some  dim  threshold  tinkles  a  ghostly  bell. 


[42] 


ELLEN  CHANDLER 

As  drowsily  she  lay  in  bed 

And  watched  the  sunlight  dance  and  quiver 

On  the  slant  ceiling  overhead, 

And  hearkened  to  the  singing  river, 

She  wondered  who  last  watched  the  light 

From  off  the  singing  water  glancing 

On  the  low  ceiling's  curded  white 

In  golden  rings  and  eddies  dancing, 

And  even  as  she  wondered,  heard 
A  voice  between  a  sigh  and  shiver, 
Though  nothing  in  the  chamber  stirred : 
"  Where  comes  no  sound  of  singing  river 
I  lie,  who  lay  where  you  lie  now, 
Daughter,  and  watched  that  golden  glancing  - 
Cold  darkness  heavy  on  my  brow, 
And  done,  the  dazzle  and  the  dancing ! ,: 


[43] 


JANE  BATHGATE 

She  never  even  stops  to  think 
What  she  is  doing  here  — 
But  scrubs  potatoes  at  the  sink 
Or  fetches  William's  beer, 

Or  baths  their  six  young  bairns,  and  mends 
Their  clothes  with  weary  eyes  — 
Throughout  a  day  that  hardly  ends 
Before  it's  time  to  rise : 

And  she'll  be  much  too  tired  to  heed 
In  the  grave's  secure  retreat, 
When  there's  no  longer  any  need 
Of  making  both  ends  meet. 


[44] 


ANTHONY  EARNSHAW 

We  found  him  sleeping  in  the  drifted  snow 

Beside  his  buried  but  still  breathing  ewes. 

'Tis  rarely  granted  any  man,  to  know 

And  find,  unsought,  the  death  that  he  would  choose ; 

Yet  he  who'd  always  laboured  among  sheep 

Since  he  could  walk,  and  who  had  often  said 

That  death  should  find  him  working,  stumbled  dead 

Succouring  his  flocks,  and  by  them  fell  asleep. 

Spare  sinewy  body  with  brown  knotted  hands 
Lean  weathered  face  and  eyes  that  burned  so  clear 
From  gazing  ever  through  the  winds  that  blow 
Over  wide  grassy  spaces,  one  who  stands 
Beside  you,  quiet  on  your  hurdle-bier, 
Envies  your  hard-earned  death  amid  the  snow. 


[45] 


CHAMBERS 


CHAMBERS 

The  labyrinthine  corridors  of  my  mind 
Between  dead,  lightless,  many-chambered  walls 
In  endless  mazes  of  confusion  wind : 
And  only  now  and  again  the  live  ray  falls, 
Touching  the  secret  spring  of  some  hid  door 
With  magic,  flinging  open  some  unknown 
Chamber  of  light  wherein  there  dwells  alone 
Beauty  or  terror  never  glimpsed  before. 

Could  but  that  ray  through  all  the  chambers  glow 

Once  and  for  ever  till  my  mind  should  burn 

One  sunlike  sphere  of  still  celestial  light! 

But  only  rarely,  opening  out  of  turn, 

Two  neighbouring  doors  spring  wide  at  once  and 

show 
Beauty  and  terror  together  in  the  night. 


[49] 


DRIFTWOOD 

Black  spars  of  driftwood  burn  to  peacock  flames, 
Sea-emeralds  and  sea-purples  and  sea-blues, 
And  all  the  innumerable  ever-changing  hues 
That  haunt  the  changeless  deeps  but  have  no  names, 
Flicker  and  spire  in  our  enchanted  sight : 
And  as  we  gaze,  the  unsearchable  mystery, 
The  unfathomed  cold  salt  magic  of  the  sea, 
Shines  clear  before  us  in  the  quiet  night. 

We  know  the  secret  that  Ulysses  sought. 
That  moonstruck  mariners  since  time  began 
Snatched  at  a  drowning  hazard  —  strangely  brought 
To  our  homekeeping  hearts  in  drifting  spars 
We  chanced  to  kindle  under  the  cold  stars  — 
The  secret  of  the  ocean-heart  of  man. 


[5o] 


THE  PAISLEY  SHAWL 

What   were   his    dreams   who   wove   this   coloured 

shawl  — 
The  grey,  hard-bitten  weaver,  gaunt  and  dour, 
Out  of  whose  grizzled  memory,  even  as  a  flower 
Out  of  bleak  Winter  at  young  April's  call 
In  the  old  tradition  of  flowers  breaks  into  bloom, 
Blossomed  the  ancient  intricate  design 
Of  softly-glowing  hues  and  exquisite  line  — 
What  were  his  dreams,  crouched  at  his  cottage  loom  ? 

What  were  her  dreams,  the  laughing  April  lass 
Who  first,  in  the  flowering  of  young  delight, 
With  parted  lips  and  eager  tilted  head 
And  shining  eyes,  about  her  shoulders  white 
Drew  the  soft  fabric  of  kindling  green  and  red, 
Standing  before  the  candle-lighted  glass? 


[5i] 


1916 

The  reek  of  boiling  cutch  :  against  the  sky- 
Wet  dripping  amber  of  the  new-dipped  sails 
Hung  on  the  crag-top  in  the  sun  to  dry 
Flapping  against  the  tarry  glistering  rails 
In  a  wind  that  brings  a  tang  of  burning  kelp : 
A  sleek  black  cormorant  on  a  scar  rose-red 
Washed  by  unfoaming  emerald,  and  the  yelp 
Of  gulls  that  wheel  unwavering  overhead  — 

Clear  colours,  searching  odours  and  keen  cries 

Sting  all  my  eager  senses  to  fresh  life 

With  tingling  ears  and  nostrils  and  smarting  eyes 

Yet  even  now  in  sick  unending  strife 

In  a  wide  slimy  welter  oversea 

Men  spill  each  other's  blood  indifferently. 


[52] 


TROOPSHIP:  MID-ATLANTIC 
(S.S.BALTIC:  July  1917) 

Dark  waters  into  crystalline  brilliance  break 
About  the  keel,  as  through  the  moonless  night 
The  dark  ship  moves  in  its  own  moving  lake 
Of  phosphorescent  cold  moon-coloured  light; 
And  to  the  clear  horizon  all  around 
Drift  pools  of  fiery  beryl  flashing  bright 
As  though  unquenchably  burning,  cold  and  white, 
A  million  moons  in  the  night  of  waters  drowned. 

And  staring  at  the  magic  with  eyes  adream 
That  never  till  now  have  looked  upon  the  sea, 
Boys  from  the  Middle-West  lounge  listlessly 
In  the  unlanterned  darkness,  boys  who  go 
Beckoned  by  some  unchallengeable  gleam 
To  unknown  lands  to  fight  an  unknown  foe. 


[531 


HANDS 

Tempest  without :  within,  the  mellow  glow 
Of  mingling  lamp  and  firelight  over  all  — 
Etchings  and  vvatercolours  on  the  wall, 
Cushions  and  curtains  of  clear  indigo, 
Rugs,  damask-red  and  blue  as  Tyrian  seas, 
Deep  chairs,  black  oaken  settles,  hammered  brass, 
Translucent  porcelain  and  sea-green  glass  — 
Colour  and  warmth  and  light  and  dreamy  ease: 

And  I  sit  wondering  where  are  now  the  hands 
That  wrought  at  anvil,  easel,  wheel  and  loom  — 
Hands,   slender,   swart,    red,   gnarled  —  in    foreign 

lands 
Or  English  shops  to  furnish  this  seemly  room : 
And  all  the  while,  without,  the  windy  rain 
Drums  like  dead  fingers  tapping  at  the  pane. 


[54l 


LINDISFARNE 

Jet-black  the  crags  of  False  Emmanuel  Head 
Against  the  Winter  sunset :  standing  stark 
Within  the  shorn  sun's  frosty  glare,  night-dark, 
A  solitary  monk  with  arms  outspread 
In  worship  or  in  frustrate  tense  desire 
Of  racked  and  tortured  flesh :  still  young  and  spare, 
With  drooping  head  he  seems  to  hang  in  air 
Crucified  on  a  wheel  of  blood-red  fire. 

The  red  sun  dips  :  and  slowly  to  his  side 

His  slack  arms  fall;  and  in  the  clear  green  light 

Of  the  frosty  afterglow  where  coldly  burns 

A  lonely  star,  a  very  pillar  of  night 

He  stands  above  the  steely  shivering  tide, 

Then  slowly  to  the  darkening  East  he  turns. 


[55] 


DUNSTANBOROUGH 

Over  the  unseen  September  tide  the  mist 
Sweeps  ever  inland,  winding  in  a  shroud 
Stark  walls  and  toppling  towers  that  in  a  cloud 
Of  streaming  vapour  soar  and  twirl  and  twist, 
Unbuilded  and  rebuilded  in  grey  smoke, 
Until  the  drifting  shadowy  bastions  seem 
The  old  phantasmal  castle  wherein  man's  dream 
Seeks  shelter  from  time's  still-pursuing  stroke. 

And  I  remember  how,  above  a  sea 

That  under  cold  winds  shivered  steely-clear, 

Fresh  from  the  chisel  clean-cut  and  white  and  hard, 

These  towers,  rock-founded  for  eternity, 

Glittered  when  Lancelot  and  Guenevere 

One  April  morning  came  to  Joyous  Gard. 


[56] 


LIFE 

On  the  cliff's  edge  a  dewy  cluster  of  thrift 

Sparkles  like  amethysts  against  the  sea, 

A  sea  of  sapphire  laced  unceasingly 

By  little  lines  of  foam  and  wings  that  drift 

And  wheel  and  dip  in  mazy  dazzling  flight 

Bewilderingly  before  my  dreaming  eyes 

That  watch  the  snow  and  sapphire  sink  and  rise, 

Drowsed  by  the  interweaving  blue  and  white. 

Yet  in  my  chambered  mind  the  while  I  see 
Within  an  attic  in  a  swarming  high 
And  cliff-like  tenement  that  blocks  the  sky, 
One  knitting  and  one  stitching  at  a  hem, 
Two  patient  women  uncomplainingly 
Talking  of  all  that  life  has  done  to  them. 


[571 


THE  PUFFIN 

He  stooped  down  suddenly  and  thrust  his  hand 
Into  a  tunnel  in  the  shallow  sand 
Beneath  a  campion-clump,  and  brought  to  light 
A  brooding  puffin  with  black  wings  clasped  tight 
To  her  white  breast :  but  twisting  round  her  sleek, 
Pied,  darting  head,  her  scarlet  razor-beak 
She  snapped  in  anger,  cutting  his  finger  clean 
To  the  very  bone ;  and  on  the  clump  of  green 
Among  the  campion  blossoms  white  as  foam 
He  dropped  the  bird  and  watched  her  scurry  home; 
And  laughed,  while  from  the  wounded  finger  dripped 
Blood  redder  even  than  the  beak  that  ripped 
The  flesh  so  cruelly,  and,  chuckling,  said  : 
"  Well,  anyway,  the  blood  still  runs  as  red 
In  my  old  veins  as  when  I  saw  it  spill 
The  first  time  that  I  felt  a  puffin's  bill 
Long  years  since :  and  it  seems  as  though  I  had 
As  little  sense  as  when  I  was  a  lad 
To  let  myself  be  caught  so  easily 
And  that  brave  bird  make  such  a  fool  of  me 
Who  thought  myself  as  wise  as  Solomon. 
Yet  it  is  better  to  feel  a  fool's  blood  run 
Still  quick  and  lively  in  the  veins  and  be 

[58] 


NEIGHBOURS 

A  living  fool  beside  the  April  sea 

Than  lie  like  Solomon  in  his  unknown  grave, 

A  pinch  of  dry  dust  that  no  wit  could  save." 


[59] 


THE  LETTER 

Why  was  I  moved  to  write 
To  him  the  very  night 
That  he,  unknown  to  me, 
Upon  his  deathbed  lay 
With  eyes  that  should  not  see 
Another  break  of  day  — 

Eyes  that  should  never  read 
The  long  light-hearted  screed 
That  rippled  from  my  pen? 
Why  should  I  write  to  him 
Whose  sight  was  even  then 
With  the  last  darkness  dim? 

For  I  had  never  heard 
From  him  a  single  word 
For  years,  or  even  thought 
If  he  were  ill  or  well: 
And  when  I  wrote  I'd  naught 
That  mattered  much  to  tell. 

Did  the  same  memory 
That  moment  moving  me 
[60] 


NEIGHBOURS 

To  take  my  pen  and  write 
Light-hearted  as  a  boy 
Move  him  on  that  last  night 
To  think  of  me  with  joy? 

Did  his  lost  youth  return 

In  one  clear  thought  and  burn 

His  being  with  the  glow 

Of  old  enraptured  hours 

When  plunging  through  deep  snow 

We  faced  the  raking  showers  ? 

Did  death  to  him  seem  just 

A  wilder  frolic  gust 

That  caught  his  breath,  and  deep 

In  dazzling  drowsy  white 

Of  downy  drifts  did  sleep 

Steal  over  him  that  night  ? 

But  time  will  never  tell 
Whether  some  fateful  spell 
Or  only  idle  whim 
Moved  me  to  write  a  screed 
Of  chaffing  words  to  him 
That  he  would  never  read. 


[61] 


BY  THE  WEIR 

A  scent  of  Esparto  grass  —  and  again  I  recall 
That  hour  we  spent  by  the  weir  of  the  paper-mill 
Watching  together  the  curving  thunderous  fall 
Of  frothing  amber,  bemused  by  the  roar  until 
My  mind  was  as  blank  as  the  speckless  sheets  that 

wound 
On  the  hot  steel  ironing-rollers  perpetually  turning 
In  the  humming  dark  rooms  of  the  mill :  all  sense 

and  discerning 
By  the  stunning  and  dazzling  oblivion  of  hill-waters 

drowned. 

And  my  heart  was  empty  of  memory  and  hope  and 

desire 
Till,  rousing,  I  looked  afresh  on  your  face  as  you 

gazed  — 
Behind  you  an  old  gnarled  fruit-tree  in  one  still  fire 
Of  innumerable  flame  in  the  sun  of  October  blazed, 
Scarlet  and  gold  that  the  first  white  frost  would  spill 
With  eddying  flicker  and  patter  of  dead  leaves  fall- 
ing— 
I  looked  on  your  face,  as  an  exile  from  Eden  re- 
calling 

[62] 


NEIGHBOURS 

A  vision  of  Eve  as  she  dallied  bewildered  and  still 
By   the    serpent-encircled   tree   of    knowledge   that 

flamed 
With  gold  and  scarlet  of  good  and  evil,  her  eyes 
Rapt  on  the  river  of  life:  then  bright  and  untamed 
By  the  labour  and  sorrow  and  fear  of  a  world  that 

dies 
Your  ignorant  eyes  looked  up  into  mine  and  I  knew 
That  never  our  hearts  should  be  one  till  your  young 

lips  had  tasted 
The  core  of  the  bitter-sweet  fruit,  and  wise  and  toil- 
wasted, 
You  should  stand  at  my  shoulder  an  outcast  from 
Eden,  too. 


[63] 


THE  PARROTS 

Somewhere,  somewhen  I've  seen. 
But  where  or  when  I'll  never  know 
Three  parrots  of  shrill  green 
With  crests  of  shriller  scarlet  flying 
Out  of  black  cedars  as  the  sun  was  dying 
Against  cold  peaks  of  snow. 

From  what  forgotten  life 

Of  other  worlds  I  cannot  tell 

Flashes  that  screeching  strife: 

Yet  the  shrill  colour  and  the  strident  crying 

Sing  through  my  blood  and  set  my  heart  replying 

And  jangling  like  a  bell. 


[64] 


THE  WILLOWS 

In  the  round  hollow  of  the  moonlit  meadow 
Over  the  pond  the  seven  willows  shiver, 
And  in  the  ghostly  misty  shine  their  branches 
Rustle  and  glance  and  quiver  — 

Rustle  and  glance  and  quiver  in  the  moonshine  — 
The  seven  sisters  shaking  sea-green  tresses 
Over  the  round  pond's  misty  mirror,  whispering 
Strange  secrets  to  the  shadow  in  the  cresses. 


[65] 


RETURN 

Rust-red  the  bracken  in  the  rain 
Against  the  wet  grey  boulder  — 
Slowly  the  cold  mist  sweeps  again 
Over  the  mountain  shoulder 
And  the  wind  blows  colder. 

Since  last  I  saw  the  wind  and  rain 
Sweep  down  the  mountain  shoulder 
Some  joy  that  will  not  come  again 
Has  left  a  heart  grown  older, 
And  the  wind  blows  colder. 


[66] 


APRIL 

Over  the  rain-wet  bells 
Of  scilla  and  daffodil 
With  April  in  their  voices 
The  blackbirds  pipe  and  trill : 

And  lucent  yellow  and  blue 

In  clear  notes  bubble  and  throng 

As  daffodil  and  scilla 

Sing  in  the  blackbirds'  song. 


[67] 


WORLDS 

Through  the  pale  green  forest  of  tall  bracken-stalks 
Whose  interwoven  fronds,  a  jade-green  sky, 
Above  me  glimmer,  infinitely  high, 
Towards  my  giant  hand  a  beetle  walks 
In  glistening  emerald  mail ;  and  as  I  lie 
Watching  his  progress  through  huge  grassy  blades 
And  over  pebble-boulders,  my  own  world  fades 
And  shrinks  to  the  vision  of  a  beetle's  eye. 

Within  that  forest  world  of  twilight  green 

Ambushed  with  unknown  perils,  one  endless  day 

I  travel  down  the  beetle-trail  between 

Huge  glossy  boles  through  green  infinity  .  .  . 

Till   flashes    a    glimpse   of    blue   sea   through   the 

bracken  asway, 
And  my  world  is  again  a  tumult  of  windy  sea. 


[68] 


THE  RIDGE 

Here  on  the  ridge  where  the  shrill  north-easter  trails 

Low  clouds  along  the  snow, 

And  in  a  streaming,  moonlit  vapour  veils 

The  peopled  earth  below, 

Let  me,  O  Life,  a  little  while  forget 
The  horror  of  past  years  — 
Man  and  his  agony  and  bloody  sweat, 
The  terror  and  the  tears, 

And  struggle  only  in  the  mist  and  snow 
Against  the  hateless  wind, 
Till,  scourged  and  shriven,  I  again  may  go 
To  dwell  among  my  kind. 


[69] 


RUGBY:  1917 


All  day  the  droning  of  the  aeroplanes 

Above  the  hot  brick  buildings  in  the  blaze, 

That  in  their  skiey  gliding  seemed  to  graze 

The  air  to  fiercer  fire  above  gilt  vanes, 

Sleek  purple  roofs,  sharp-pricking  spires,  and  towers 

Of  glowing  mottled  brick;  and  through  my  head 

That  droning  hums  and  purrs,  as  aching  red 

And  staring  blue  trail  by  the  unending  hours. 

But  under  silvery  olive-trees  he  sleeps 

Tombed  in  a  hill  of  marble  on  the  Isle 

Of  Skyros  that  once,  veiled  in  shimmering  rain, 

I  saw  in  passing.     On  the  rosy  steeps 

And  silvery  trees  he  looked  a  little  while ; 

Then  turned  to  slumber,  never  to  wake  again. 


[7o] 


RUGBY:  1917 

II 

He  slumbers :  but  his  living  words  sing  on, 

Lighting  for  ever  the  dark  hearts  of  men, 

The  hearts  of  men  on  whom  his  presence  shone 

Living,  who'll  never  see  his  like  again 

In  this  world,  and  strange  hearts  that  caught  no 

gleam 
Of  the  golden  spirit  until  his  radiant  death 
Blazoned  it  over  all  the  earth,  a  breath 
Of  singing  fire  from  sunset  seas  of  dream. 

O  singing  fire,  O  starry  words  that  sang 

A  moment  through  his  lighted  blood,  and  live 

When  he  who  gave  you  loving  life  is  dead, 

For  ever  to  that  fallen  golden  head 

And   the   laughing  golden  heart   from   which  you 

sprang 
Starry  and  singing  and  deathless  life  you  give. 


\7*] 


BLOOM 

Laburnum,  lilac,  honeysuckle,  broom, 

Syringa,  rowan,  hawthorn,  guelder-rose, 

Azalea,  rose  and  elder  —  Summer  glows 

About  me  in  sultry  smother  of  scent  and  bloom 

Shut  in  between  the  old  walls'  mossy  brick: 

Yet  as  in  the  green  and  golden  gloom  I  dream 

In  the  drowsy  dazzle  of  perfume  and  colour  astream 

An  upland  odour  stings  me  to  the  quick  — 

The  shrewd  remembered  smell,  sharp  clean  and  cold, 

Of  peat  and  moss  where  never  blossoms  blow 

Under  the  shadow  of  bleak  whinstone  scars 

The  summer  long,  or  only  rarely  show 

Over  black  pools  the  sundew's  stars  of  gold 

Or  grass  of  Parnassus'  cold  white  scentless  stars. 


[72] 


VICTIMS 

Above  me  on  the  ridge  an  old  grey  ram 
With  ragged  fleece,  black  muzzle  and  yellow  eye, 
Tangled  in  briars,  against  the  lurid  sky, 
Seems  even  now  to  await  the  Abraham 
Who  shall  release  and  slay  him  —  patiently 
On  this  high  altar  of  bleak  snow  and  ice 
With  head  bowed  ready  for  the  sacrifice 
To  await  the  whetted  blade  of  destiny. 

He  awaits  unwondering,  foreboding  naught, 
With  blank,  cold,  shallow  eye  and  easy  breath, 
Nor  knows  himself  the  destined  victim  caught, 
Nor  dreads  the  slicing  sacrificial  knife  — 
While  Abraham,  ever  in  the  shadow  of  death, 
Trembles  to  look  upon  the  angel  of  life. 


[73] 


ISHMAEL 

He  came  at  last  to  a  cadaverous  land 

Beneath  a  breathless  livid  sky  supine 

And  limping  over  the  burnt  stone  and  sand 

Reached  a  sleek  lake  of  glazed  unrippling  brine, 

And  standing  ankle-deep  in  brittle  salt 

That  crusted  the  flat  marge  with  prickling  white, 

Lifted  his  eyes  to  the  grey  sunless  vault, 

And  waited  for  the  coming  on  of  night. 

But  never  night  with  black  oblivious  balm 
Or  the  healing  lucency  of  starlight  stole 
Across  that  arid  sky  of  aching  grey. 
Undying,  by  the  dead  lake's  stagnant  calm, 
Caged  in  uncrumbling  bones,  for  ever  his  soul 
Stares  at  the  blind  face  of  unending  day. 


[74] 


\ 


THE  DANCER 

Sheathed  in  scales  of  silver  sequins 

In  a  blue  pool  of  limelight  dancing 

She  twists  and  twirls  and  smiles  and  beckons 

With  dark  eyes  glancing  — 

She  beckons  to  me  in  my  skiey  seat 
With  smiling  teeth  and  dark  eyes  glancing: 
But  I  only  see  as  I  watch  her  dancing. 
The  shadows  that  seek  to  tangle  her  feet. 


[75] 


SONG 

Over  the  heather  the  trill  of  a  falling  stream 
Sings  in  my  ears  like  the  silver  voice  of  the  light, 
The  light  that  falls  from  the  stars  in  a  silver  stream 
Into  the  pool  of  night  — 

Into  the  quiet  pool  of  the  night  of  dream 

Where  life  that's  a  singing  of  joyful  or  sorrowful 

breath 
Sinks  in  the  icy  deep  of  the  starless  dream 
Of  joyless  and  sorrowless  death. 


[76] 


INSPIRATION 

On  the  uttermost  farflung  ridge  of  ice  and  snow 

That  over  pits  of  sunset  fire  hangs  sheer 

My  naked  spirit  poises,  then  leaps  clear 

From  the  cold  crystal  into  the  furnace-glow 

Of  ruby  and  amber  lucencies,  and  dives 

For  the  brief  moment  of  ten  thousand  lives 

Through  fathomless  infinities  of  light, 

Then  cleansed  by  lustral  flame  and   frost  returns; 

And  for  an  instant  through  my  body  burns 

The  immortal  fire  of  cold  white  ecstasy. 

As  down  the  darkening  valley  of  the  night 

I  keep  the  old  track  of  mortality. 


[77) 


BRIC-A-BRAC 

Into  the  room  the  level  sunrays  stream, 
Shooting  from  under  a  low  rainy  cloud 
Through  shivering  branches  of  a  poplar  bowed 
In  the  wind  of  sunset;  and  in  golden  dream 
The  dull  day  ends;  and  the  walls  of  creamy  white 
Quiver  with  rippling  gold  that  fills  the  glass 
Of  a  green  amphora  with  wine-golden  light, 
And  burnishes  old  Benares  brass. 

And  suddenly  in  the  quickening  glory  of  gold 
Buddha,  who  long  has  brooded  in  the  gloom 
Overshadowed  by  a  curved  Askari  knife, 
Wrapped  in  his  rope  of  reverie  manifold 
Glows  young  and  fair,  the  very  lord  of  life 
Until  his  presence  fills  the  little  room. 


[78] 


FIRE 

I 

Across  the  Cleveland  countryside  the  train 
Panted  and  jolted  through  the  lurid  night 
Of  monstrous  slag-heaps  in  the  leaping  light 
Of  belching  furnaces :  the  driving  rain 
Lacing  the  glass  with  gold  in  that  red  glare 
That  momently  revealed  the  cinderous  land 
Of  blasted  fields  that  stretched  on  either  hand 
With  livid  waters  gleaming  here  and  there. 

By  hovels  of  men  who  labour  till  they  die 
With  iron  and  the  fire  that  never  sleeps 
We  plunged  in  pitchy  night  among  huge  heaps : 
Then  once  again  that  red  glare  lit  the  sky, 
And,  high  above  the  highest  hill  of  slag, 
I  saw  Prometheus  hanging  from  his  crag. 


[79) 


FIRE 

II 

In  each  black  tile  a  mimic  fire's  aglow, 
And  in  the  hearthlight  old  mahogany, 
Ripe  with  stored  sunshine  that  in  Mexico 
Poured  like  gold  wine  into  the  living  tree 
Summer  on  summer  through  a  century, 
Burns  like  a  crater  in  the  heart  of  night: 
And  all  familiar  things  in  the  ingle-light 
Glow  with  a  secret  strange  intensity. 

And  I  remember  hidden  fires  that  burst 
Suddenly  from  the  midnight  while  men  slept, 
Long-smouldering  rages  in  the  darkness  nursed 
That  to  an  instant  ravening  fury  leapt, 
And  the  old  terror  menacing  evermore 
A  crumbling  world  with  fiery  molten  core. 


[80] 


ELEGY 

Stars  that  fall  through  crystal  skies  - 
Winds  that  sink  in  songless  death  — 
Are  the  light  within  man's  eyes 
And  his  body's  breath. 

For  a  little  while  he  burns 
Fitfully,  a  windy  spark, 
Ere  his  shrivelled  soul  returns 
To  the  windy  dark. 


[81] 


CASUALTIES 


TO  MICHAEL 

If  the  promise  of  your  coming's  true, 
And  you  should  live  through  years  of  peace, 
O  son  of  mine,  forget  not  these, 
The  sons  of  man,  who  died  for  you. 


[85] 


ANGUS  ARMSTRONG 

I 

Ghostly  through  the  drifting  mist  the  lingering  snow- 
wreaths  glimmer, 

And  ghostly  comes  the  lych-owl's  hunting  cry, 

And  ghostly  with  wet  fleeces  in  the  watery  moon 
ashimmer, 

One  by  one  the  grey  sheep  slowly  pass  me  by. 

One  by  one  through  bent  and  heather,  disappearing 
in  the  hollow, 

Ghostly  shadows  down  the  grassy  track  they  steal : 

And  I  dread  to  see  them  passing,  lest  a  ghost  be- 
hind them  follow  — 

A  ghost  from  Flanders  follow,  dog  at  heel. 


[86] 


ALAN  GORDON 

Roses  he  loved  and  their  outlandish  names  — 

Gloire  de  Dijon,  Leonie  Lamesch, 

Chateau  du  Clos  Vougeot  —  like  living  flames 

They  kindled  in  his  memory  afresh 

As,  lying  in  the  mud  of  France,  he  turned 

His  eyes  to  the  grey  sky,  light  after  light : 

And  last  within  his  dying  memory  burned 

Chateau  du  Clos  Vougeot's  deep  crimson  night. 


[*7] 


JACK  ALLEN 

"I'm  mighty  fond  of  blackberry-jam,"  he  said: 
"  It  tastes  of  Summer.     When  I  come  again, 
You'll  give  me  some  for  tea,  and  soda-bread?  " 

Black  clusters  throng  each  bramble-spray  burned  red, 
And  over-ripe,  are  rotting  in  the  rain : 
But  not  for  him  is  any  table  spread 
Who  comes  not  home  again. 


[88] 


MARTIN  AKENSHAW 

Heavy  the  scent  of  elder  in  the  air 
As  on  the  night  he  went :  the  starry  bloom 
He'd  brushed  in  passing  dusted  face  and  hair, 
And  the  hot  fragrance  filled  the  little  room. 

Heavy  the  scent  of  elder:  in  the  night 
Where  I  lie  lone  abed  with  stifling  breath 
And  eyes  that  dread  to  see  the  morning  light, 
The  heavy  fume  of  elder  smells  of  death. 


[89] 


RALPH  STRAKER 

Softly  out  of  the  dove-grey  sky 

Drift  the  snow-flakes  fine  and  dry 

Till  braeside  and  bottom  are  all  heaped  high. 

Remembering  how  he  would  love  to  go 
Over  the  crisp  and  the  creaking  snow, 
I  wonder  that  now  he  can  lie  below 

If  softly  out  of  the  Flanders  sky 

Drift  the  snowflakes  fine  and  dry 

Till  crater  and  shell-hole  are  all  heaped  high. 


[9o] 


DONALD  FRASER 

He  polished  granite  tombstones  all  his  life 
To  earn  a  living  for  his  bairns  and  wife 
Till  he  was  taken  for  the  war,  and  he 
Went  his  first  voyage  over  the  salt  sea. 

Now  somewhere  underneath  the  Flemish  skies 
Sunk  in  unsounded  flats  of  mud  he  lies 
In  a  vast  moundless  grave,  unnamed,  unknown, 
Nor  marked  at  head  or  foot  by  stock  or  stone. 


[9i] 


PETER  PROUDFOOT 

He  cleaned  out  middens  for  his  daily  bread 
War  took  him  overseas  and  on  a  bed 
Of  lilies-of -the- valley  dropt  him,  dead. 


[92] 


JOE  BARNES 

To  a  proud  peacock  strutting  tail  in  air 
He  clipped  the  yew  each  thirteenth  of  July : 
No  feather  ruffled,  sleek  and  debonair, 
Clean-edged  it  cut  the  yellow  evening  sky. 

But  he  returns  no  more,  who  went  across 
The  narrow  seas  one  thirteenth  of  July: 
And  drearily  all  day  the  branches  toss, 
Ragged  and  dark  against  the  rainy  sky. 


T93l 


DICK  MILBURN 

He  stood  against  the  trunk  to  light  his  pipe, 
And,  glancing  at  the  green  boughs  overhead, 
"  We'll  pinch  those  almonds  when  they're  ripe,"  he 
said. 

But  now  the  almond-shells  are  brown  and  ripe 
Somewhere  in  No-man's-land  he's  lying  dead; 
And  other  lads  are  pinching  them  instead. 

I've  half-a-mind  to  save  him  one  or  two 
In  case  his  ghost  comes  back  to  claim  a  few 
And  do  the  other  things  he  meant  to  do. 


Ml 


PHILIP  DAGG 

It  pricked  like  needles  slashed  into  his  face, 
The  unceasing,  rustling  smother  of  dry  snow 
That  stormed  the  ridge  on  that  hell-raking  blast 

And  then  he  knew  the  end  had  come  at  last, 
And  stumbled  blindly,  muttering  "  Cheerio !  ': 
Into  eternity  and  left  no  trace. 


[95] 


JOHN  ELSDON 

Stripped  mother-naked  save  for  a  gold  ring, 
Where  all  day  long  the  gaping  doctors  sit 
Decreeing  life  or  death,  he  proudly  passed 
In  his  young  manhood :  and  they  found  him  fit. 

Of  all  that  lustiness  of  flesh  and  blood 
The  crash  of  death  has  not  left  anything: 
But,  tumbled  somewhere  in  the  Flanders  mire, 
Unbroken  lies  the  golden  wedding  ring. 


M 


NOEL  DARK 

She  sleeps  in  bronze,  the  Helen  of  his  dream, 
Within  the  quiet  of  my  little  room, 
Touched  by  a  kindling  birch-log's  flickering  gleam 
To  tenderer  beauty  in  the  rosy  gloom. 

She  sleeps  in  bronze  :  and  he  who  fashioned  her, 
Shaping  the  wet  clay  with  such  eager  joy, 
Slumbers  as  soundly  where  the  cold  winds  stir 
The  withered  tussocks  on  the  plains  of  Troy. 


[97] 


MARK  ANDERSON 

On  the  low  table  by  the  bed 
Where  it  was  set  aside  last  night, 
Beyond  the  bandaged  lifeless  head, 
It  glitters  in  the  morning-light : 

And  as  the  hours  of  watching  pass, 
I  cannot  sleep,  I  cannot  think, 
But  only  gaze  upon  the  glass 
Of  water  that  he  could  not  drink. 


[98] 


IN  KHAKI 


THE  KITTIWAKE 

With  blistered  heels  and  bones  that  ache, 
Marching  through  pitchy  ways  and  blind, 
The  mirey  track  is  hard  to  make : 
Yet,  ever  hovering  in  my  mind, 
Above  red  crags  a  kittiwake 
Hangs  motionless  against  the  wind  — 

Grey-winged,  white-breasted  and  black-eyed, 
Above  red  crags  of  porphyry 
That  pillar  from  a  sapphire  tide 
A  sapphire  sky  .  .  .  Indifferently 
The  raw  lad  limping  at  my  side 
Blasphemes  his  boots  the  world  and  me  .  .  . 

Still  keen,  unwavering  and  alert 
Within  my  aching  empty  mind 
The  bright  bird  hovers,  and  the  dirt 
Of  bottomless  black  ways  and  blind, 
And  all  the  hundred  things  that  hurt 
Past  healing  seem  to  drop  behind. 


[ioi] 


MEDICAL  OFFICERS'  CLERK 

Let  me  forget  these  sordid  histories 
These  callous  records  of  obscene  disease, 
This  world  of  scabies  and  of  syphilis 
Wherein  I  drudge  until  my  whole  mind  is 
Besotted  by  the  sodden  atmosphere  .  .  . 

Let  me  remember  Venus  dawning  clear 
Through  beryl  seas  of  air,  a  crystal  flame  — 
Glistening  as  from  the  cold  salt  wave  she  came 
Over  the  far  and  ghostly  hills  of  Wales 
Dwindling  in  darkness  as  the  twilight  fails  .  .  . 

Let  me  recall  the  singing  and  the  shine 
Of  the  clear  amber  waters  of  the  Tyne, 
Pouring  from  peaty  uplands  of  black  moss 
Over  grey  boulders,  while  the  salmon  toss 
Wet,  curving  silver  bodies  in  the  air, 
Scrambling  in  shoals  to  scale  the  salmon-stair 
Over  the  roaring  weir  .  .  . 

•      Let  me  again 
League  after  league  of  level  stainless  snow 
Stretching  unbroken  under  the  low  sky 

[102] 


NEIGHBOURS 

In  that  huge  clanking  and  eternal  train 
Over  the  prairies  of  Dakota  go  — 
World  without  end  to  all  eternity  — 
Until  desire  and  dream  and  all  delight 
Drowse  to  oblivion  in  a  timeless  white 
Unundulating  wilderness  .  .  . 

Or  let  me  sail 
Again  up  the  blue  Bosporus  within  hail 
Of  many-fountained  gardens  of  the  rose 
Where   bloom    on   bloom   the    Summer   burns   and 

glows, 
By  minarets  that  soar  like  lily-blooms 
About  the  shimmering  white  mushroom  domes 
Of  marble  mosques  in  groves  of  cypresses  .  .  . 

Till  I  remember  no  more  histories 
Of  horror,  or  in  drudgery  and  fret 
Of  endless  days  no  longer  quite  forget 
The  stars  and  singing  waters  and  the  snow, 
And  how  the  roses  of  Arabia  blow. 


[i"3l 


THE  CHART 

Drawing  red  lines  on  a  chart 
With  diligent  ruler  and  pen, 
Keeping  a  record  of  men, 
Numbers  and  names  in  black  ink  — 
Numbers  and  names  that  were  men 

With  diligent  ruler  and  pen 
Drawing  red  lines  on  a  chart  — 
Would  you  not  break,  O  my  heart, 
If  I  stopped  but  a  moment  to  think! 


[104] 


THE  CONSCRIPT 

Indifferent,  flippant,  earnest,  but  all  bored, 
The  doctors  sit  in  the  glare  of  electric  light 
Watching  the  endless  stream  of  naked  white 
Bodies  of  men  for  whom  their  hasty  award 
Means  life  or  death  maybe  or  the  living  death 
Of  mangled  limbs,  blind  eyes  or  a  darkened  brain: 
And  the  chairman  as  his  monocle  falls  again 
Pronounces  each  doom  with  easy  indifferent  breath. 

Then  suddenly  I  shudder  as  I  see 

A  young  man  move  before  them  wearily, 

Cadaverous  as  one  already  dead : 

But  still  they  stare  untroubled  as  he  stands 

With  arms  outstretched  and  drooping  thorn-crowned 

head, 
The  nail-marks  glowing  in  his  feet  and  hands. 


[105] 


SUSPENSE 

As  gaudy  flies  across  a  pewter  plate 

On  the  grey  disk  of  the  unrippling  sea, 

Beneath  an  airless  sullen  sky  of  slate, 

Dazzled  destroyers  zig-zag  restlessly: 

While  underneath  the  sleek  and  livid  tide, 

Blind  monsters  nosing  through  the  soundless  deep, 

Lean  submarines  among  blind  fishes  glide 

And  through  primeval  weedy  forests  sweep. 

Over  the  hot  grey  surface  of  my  mind 
Glib  motley  rumours  zig-zag  without  rest ; 
While  deep  within  the  darkness  of  my  breast 
Monstrous  desires,  lean  sinister  and  blind, 
Slink  through  unsounded  night  and  stir  the  slime 
And  ooze  of  oceans  of  forgotten  time. 


[106] 


AIR-RAID 

Night  shatters  in  mid-heaven :  the  bark  of  guns, 
The  roar  of  planes,  the  crash  of  bombs,  and  all 
The  unshackled  skiey  pandemonium  stuns 
The  senses  to  indifference,  when  a  fall 
Of  masonry  nearby  startles  awake, 
Tingling  wide-eyed,  prick-eared,  with  bristling  hair, 
Each  sense  within  the  body,  crouched  aware 
Like  some  sore-hunted  creature  in  the  brake. 

Yet  side  by  side  we  lie  in  the  little  room 

Just  touching  hands,  with  eyes  and  ears  that  strain 

Keenly,  yet  dream-bewildered  through  tense  gloom, 

Listening,  in  helpless  stupor  of  insane 

Drugged  nightmare  panic  fantastically  wild, 

To  the  quiet  breathing  of  our  sleeping  child. 


[107] 


RAGTIME 

A  minx  in  khaki  struts  the  limelit  boards : 
With   false  moustache,  set  smirk  and  ogling  eyes 
And  straddling  legs  and  swinging  hips  she  tries 
To  swagger  it  like  a  soldier,  while  the  chords 
Of  rampant  ragtime  jangle,  clash  and  clatter, 
And  over  the  brassy  blare  and  drumming  din 
She  strains  to  squirt  her  squeaky  notes  and  thin 
Spirtle  of  sniggering  lascivious  patter. 

Then  out  into  the  jostling  Strand  I  turn, 

And  down  a  dark  lane  to  the  quiet  river, 

One  stream  of  silver  under  the  full  moon, 

And  think  of  how  cold  searchlights  flare  and  burn 

Over  dank  trenches  where  men  crouch  and  shiver, 

Humming,  to  keep  their  hearts  up,  that  same  tune. 


[108] 


LEAVE 

Crouched  on  the  crowded  deck,  we  watch  the  sun 

In  naked  gold  leap  out  of  the  cold  sea 

Of  shivering  silver;  and  stretching  drowsily 

Crampt  arms  and  legs,  relieved  that  night  is  done 

And  the  slinking,  deep-sea  peril  passed,  we  turn 

Westward  to  see  the  chilly,  sparkling  light 

Quicken  the  Wicklow  Hills,  till  jewel-bright 

In  their  Spring  freshness  of  dewy  green  they  burn. 

And  silent  on  the  deck  beside  me  stands 
A  comrade,  lean  and  brown,  with  restless  hands 
And  eyes  that  stare  unkindling  on  the  life 
And  rapture  of  green  hills  and  glistening  morn : 
He  comes  from  Flanders  home  to  his  dead  wife, 
And  I,  from  England,  to  my  son  newborn. 


[109] 


BACCHANAL 

(November  1918) 

Into  the  twilight  of  Trafalgar  Square 

They  pour  from  every  quarter,  banging  drums 

And  tootling  penny  trumpets :  to  a  blare 

Of  tin  mouth-organs,  while  a  sailor  strums 

A  solitary  banjo,  lads  and  girls 

Locked  in  embraces,  in  a  wild  dishevel 

Of  flags  and  streaming  hair,  with  curdling  skirls 

Surge  in  a  frenzied  reeling  panic  revel. 

Lads  who  so  long  have  stared  death  in  the  face, 
Girls  who  so  long  have  tended  death's  machines, 
Released  from  the  numb  terror  shriek  and  prance: 
And  watching  them,  I  see  the  outrageous  dance, 
The  frantic  torches  and  the  tambourines 
Tumultuous  on  the  midnight  hills  of  Thrace. 


[no] 


CAMOUFLAGE 

Out  of  the  puddle  of  his  mind  there  poured 
A  sickly  trickle  of  obscenities 
Till  some  chance  word  of  mine  waked  into  life 
Within  his  heart  half-frozen  memories: 

And  then  with  shining  eyes  he  talked  of  home, 
His  wife  and  their  one  bairn,  a  little  lass, 
And  all  her  darling  ways :  but  suddenly 
I  saw  the  radiance  from  his  blue  eyes  pass 

As,  slouching  up  to  us,  another  chum 
Cursed  the  lance-jack  with  casual  blasphemies : 
And  once  again  from  that  slack  mouth  poured  out 
A  sickly  trickle  of  obscenities. 


[in] 


THE  OLEOGRAPH 

After  the  bomb,  there  stood  one  parlour-wall, 

Papered  with  roses,  still  defying  fate. 

And  smiling  in  its  gold  frame  over  all 

A  portrait  of  King  Edward,  hanging  straight, 

The  glass  unbroken  and  the  gilt  unsmashed, 

Still  blandly  beaming,  if  a  trifle  bored, 

As  it  had  blandly  beamed  when  darkness  crashed 

On  him  who  hung  it  by  its  crimson  cord. 


[112] 


BAGGAGE 

Three  girls  who  still  have  something  of  the  grace 
Of  fleeting  girlishness  in  form  and  face, 
Tricked  out  in  all  their  fripperies,  await 
The  first  three  comers  through  the  barrack-gate. 

They  await  the  first  three  comers,  any  three, 
Smart,  sullen,  loutish,   swaggering  or  brave  — 
Soldiers,  who'll  soon  forget  them  for  the  grave  — 
Lovers,  whom  they'll  forget  as  easily 
As  they've  forgotten  last  year's  finery. 


["31 


LONG  TOM 

He  talked  of  Delhi  brothels  half  the  night, 
Quaking  with  fever;  and  then  dragging  tight 
The  frowsy  blankets  to  his  chattering  chin 
Cursed  for  an  hour  because  they  were  so  thin, 
And  nothing  would  keep  out  that  gnawing  cold  — 
Scarce  forty  years  of  age,  and  yet  so  old, 
Haggard  and  worn,  with  burning  eyes  set  deep  — 
Until  at  last  he  cursed  himself  asleep. 

Before  I'd  shut  my  eyes  reveille  came; 

And  as  I  dressed  by  the  one  candle-flame, 

The  mellow  golden  light  fell  on  his  face 

Still  sleeping,  touching  it  to  tender  grace, 

Rounding  the  features  life  had  scarred  so  deep, 

Till  youth  came  back  to  him  in  quiet  sleep : 

And  then  what  women  saw  in  him  I  knew, 

And  why  they'd  love  him  all  his  brief  life  through. 


[114] 


SENTRY  GO 

True  lad  who  shared  the  guard  with  me 
That  night  of  whirling  snow, 
What  other  nights  have  brought  to  you 
I  may  not  know. 

Although  I  never  heard  your  name 
And  hardly  saw  your  face ; 
You  poured  out  all  your  heart  to  me 
As  we  kept  pace. 

I  don't  know  if  you're  living  still, 
Or  fallen  in  the  fight : 
But  in  my  heart  your  heart  is  safe 
Till  the  last  night. 


["Si 


REVEILLE 

Still  bathed  in  its  moonlight  slumber,  the  little  white 

house  by  the  cedar 
Stands  silent  against  the  red  dawn ; 
And  nothing  I   know  of  who  sleeps  there,  to  the 

travail  of  day  yet  unwakened, 
Behind  the  blue  curtains  undrawn : 

But  I  dream  as  we  march  down  the  roadway,  ringing 
loud  and  rime-white  in  the  moonlight, 

Of  a  little  dark  house  on  a  hill 

Wherein  when  the  battle  is  over,  to  the  rapture  of 
day  yet  unwakened, 

We  shall  slumber  as  soundless  and  still. 


[116] 


TRAVELS 


AULLA 

Bronzed  hills  of  oak  that  sweep 

Up  to  Carrara's  peaks  of  snow 

Against  a  blue  November  sky, 

Burnished  with  evening  sunshine,  glow 

And  bask  in  drowsy  sleep  — 

When  piercingly  a  cry 

Rings  from  the  little  town  below, 

And  startled  echoes  leap 

From  steep  to  steep. 

What  soul  in  agony 

Cried  out  at  sunset  long  ago 

I'll  never  know : 

But  in  my  memory  perpetually 

Bronze  hills  and  silver  peaks  and  steely  sky 

Reverberate  with  that  despairing  cry. 


[ii9l 


THE  CAKEWALK 

In  smoky  lamplight  of  a  Smyrna  cafe 
He  sees  them,  seven  solemn  negroes  dancing 
With  faces  rapt  and  out-thrust  bellies  prancing 
In  a  slow  solemn  ceremonial  cakewalk. 
Dancing  and  prancing  to  the  sombre  tom-tom 
Thumped  by  a  crookbacked  grizzled  negro  squat- 
ting: 
And  as  he  watches  ...  in  the  steamy  twilight 
Of  swampy  forest  in  rank  greenness  rotting 
That  sombre  tom-tom  at  his  heartstrings  strumming 
Sets  all  his  sinews  twitching  and  a  singing 
Of  cold  fire  through  his  blood  —  and  he  is  dancing 
Among  his  fellows  in  the  dank  green  twilight 
With  naked  oiled  bronze-gleaming  bodies  swinging 
In  a  rapt  holy  everlasting  cakewalk 
For  evermore  in  slow  procession  prancing. 


[I20| 


THE  S  SAL  Y 

Sun-steeped  translucent  marble,  and  beyond, 
Pale  marble  hills  of  amethyst  and  rose 
Above  the  shadowy  olive-grove  that  shows 
A  sea-green  shimmer  like  a  tide-left  pond 
Of  brackish  waters  under  the  pale  blue  sky 
Of  the  unclouded  noon  of  Thessaly : 
And  over  that  pallid  sky  and  pallid  sea 
Obliviously  the  sultry  hours  drift  by  — 
Drift  by  in  sun-steeped  and  translucent  dream, 
Till  suddenly  a  seagull's  strident  scream 
Stabs  through  my  sense,  and  once  again  I  ride 
In  a  little  coble  the  dark  tossing  tide 
Of  glancing,  shivering  Northern  seas,  a  boy 
Chanting  to  that  dark  sky  the  tale  of  Troy. 


[121] 


SMYRNA 

Over  the  mountain's  shadowed  snow 

A  rosy  flake,  the  moon 

Drifts  in  the  beryl  glow 

Of  early  night: 

And  over  the  still  sea 

Of  malachite 

Sings  from  the  marble  quay, 

Where  blue-black  Nubians  crouch  in  shivering  cold, 

A  shrill  and  reedy  tune 

My  heart  first  heard 

In  Uganda  forests  piped  by  some  dead  bird 

In  unremembered  days  of  old. 


[122] 


CHALLENGE 

Why  does  the  seamew  scream 
When  I  would  lie  at  rest, 
Floating  in  dreamless  dream 
On  the  dark  sea's  breast, 
Floating  forgetfully 
On  the  unremembering  sea 
Of  eternity? 

Sick  of  the  senseless  fret 

Of  blind  and  bitter  strife, 

Fain  would  my  heart  forget 

The  challenge  of  life: 

But  foamheads  ruffle  and  gleam, 

And  tumult  shatters  my  dream 

At  the  seamew's  scream. 


[123I 


ON  BROADWAY 

Daffodils  dancing  by  moonlight  in  English  meadows, 
Moon-pale  daffodils  under  the  April  moon  — 
Here   in  the  throng   and   clangour   and    hustle   of 

Broadway, 
Broadway  brawling  and  loud  in  the  glare  of  the 

noon, 
Comes  to  me  now  as  a  half-remembered  tune 
The   silence   and   wonder  of   daffodils   dancing  by 

moonlight, 
Dreamily     dancing    in     dew-sprinkled     moonshiny 

meadows, 
Ghostly  daffodils  under  a  ghostly  moon. 


[124] 


IN  FIFTH  AVENUE 

A  negro  in  a  dandy  livery 
Of  blue  and  silver,  dangling  from  one  hand 
A  rose-emblazoned  bandbox  jauntily  — 
With  conscious  smile  of  gold  and  ivory 
He  ambles  down  the  sidewalk  .  .  . 

And  I  see 
Him  naked,  in  a  steamy  forest-land 
Of  dense  green  swamp,  beneath  a  dripping  tree, 
Crouched  for  the  spring,  and  grinning  greedily. 


[125] 


ON  STATEN  ISLAND,  1917 

Out  of  the  bosky  glen  into  the  still  Summer  night 
Fluttering,    twinkling,    sparkling,    light   upon    fairy 

light 
The  fireflies  glance  and  dance  in  an  endless  flickering 

flight. 

And  over  the  still  grey  Hudson,  stabbing  the  silvery 

haze 
The  flaring  festal  lights  of  Coney  Island  blaze 
Where  men  and  women  dance  in  a  razzling-dazzling 

daze  .  .  . 

And  sitting  in  silence  under  the  dark  unrustling  trees 
We  think  of  the  lads  who  crouch  in  trenches  over- 
seas 
With  eyes  that  stare  all  night  on  other  lights  than 
these. 


[126] 


THE  LOST  RING 

Thridding  the  little  tangled  wood  that  crested 

With  silver-birch  the  silvery  wave-like  dune, 

A  slashing  twig  from  off  my  finger  wrested 

The  golden  ring  just  as  the  wintry  moon 

Plunged  in  black  cloud,  and  from  my  clutching  hand 

It  tumbled  noiseless  in  the  shadowy  sand. 

All  night  in  vain  with  fearful  eager  fingers 
I  raked  among  the  sand  and  rustling  leaves : 
Dawn  came,  noon  passed :  and  now  the  last  light 

lingers 
Along  the  lake,  and  still  my  cold  heart  grieves 
Love's  token  lost,  as  through  my  naked  hand 
Life  seems  to  trickle  coldly  as  dead  sand. 


[127] 


IN  INDIANA 

Snow  on  the  hills  and  stars  in  a  crystal  sky  .  .  . 
Around  me  the  golden  leagues  of  the  prairie  lie 
Under  the  blaze  of  July : 

And  my  heart  turns  home  to  the  hills  in  their  win- 
try white 
As  I  saw  them  last  on  that  December  night 
Lustrous  in  cold  starlight  — 

To  the  hills  of  my  heart  that  are  far  over  land  and 

sea 
And  the  snug  little  house  on  the  Beacon  where  I 

would  be,  v 

That  is  all-in-all  to  me. 

So  under  the  glare  of  July 

While  around  me  the  aching  leagues  of  the  prairie 

lie, 
I  long  for  the  snow  on  the  hills  and  the  stars  in  a 

crystal  sky. 


[128] 


BY  LAKE  MICHIGAN 

As  out  of  intricate  wintry  woods  to-night 
Through  white  dunes  suddenly  on  the  starlit  lake 
I  came,  and  saw  the  windy  waters  break, 
Frothing  along  the  sand,  beneath  the  light 
Of  far  steel  furnaces  whose  ruddy  flare 
Was  mingled  with  the  glitter  of  stars,  once  more 
Among  the  ghostly  dunes  of  that  strange  shore 
I  knew  the  desolation  of  despair. 

Though  I  by  day  and  night  unceasingly 
Hunger  for  you  and  for  the  hills  of  home: 
Yet  that  heart-breaking  beauty  of  starry  foam 
And  rosy  fire  to  livelier  agony 
Shivered  my  courage  —  till  in  dreams  you  came 
And  filled  my  heart  with  stars  and  rosy  flame. 


[129] 


WINDOWS 


The  hills  of  Wales  burned  only  dimmer  gold 

Beneath  gold  skies  as  over  the  green  shires 

I  looked  from  my  high  window  on  the  fires 

Of  sunset  kindling;  but  they  could  not  hold 

My  vagrant  thought  that  in  an  instant  leapt 

To  a  window  overseas  that  from  a  height 

Looks  down  an  alley  where  a  girl  one  night 

Was  done  to  death  while,  knowing  naught,  I  slept. 

And  brooding  in  my  chair  I  wonder  why 

The  golden  uplands  and  the  glistering  sky 

Should  bring  that  horror  of  the  dark  to  mind, 

And  in  my  consciousness  I  seek  to  trace 

The  ray  that  glimmers  through  dark  ways  and  blind 

Between  the  sunset  and  a  dead  girl's  face. 


[130] 


WINDOWS 

II 

If  I  could  live  within  the  ray  of  light 
That  runs  through  all  things  everlastingly  — 
Not  only  glimpse  in  moments  of  clear  sight 
The  glancing  of  the  golden  shuttles  that  ply 
"Twixt  things  diverse  in  seeming,  stars  and  mud, 
Innocence  and  the  deed  in  darkness  done, 
The  victim  and  the  spiller  of  the  blood  — 
The  light  that  weaves  the  universe  in  one, 
Then  might  my  heart  have  ease  and  rest  content 
On  the  golden  upland  under  the  clear  sky : 
But  ever  must  my  restless  days  be  spent 
Following  the  fugitive  gleam  until  I  die  — 
Light-shotten  darkness,  glory  struck  from  strife, 
Terror  to  beauty  kindling,  death,  to  life. 


[131] 


TRAVELS 

Atlantic  and  Pacific  I  have  sailed, 

And  sojourned  in  old  cities  of  Cathay, 

Icy  Himalayas  and  stark  Alps  I've  scaled, 

And  up  great  golden  rivers  thrust  my  way 

Through  crass,  green,  acrid,  ominous  dripping  night 

Of  Senegambia  :  over  the  still  snows 

Of  polar  lands  flushed  with  unfading  rose 

Of  the  rayless  sun's  cold  clipped  unkindling  light, 

Through  the  great  Canyon's  twilight  mystery, 

And  over  Arizona's  sand  and  stone 

I  travel  the  round  world  unceasingly, 

Unresting,  uncompanioned  and  apart : 

Yet  never  may  I  pierce  the  dark  unknown 

And  undiscovered  country  of  my  own  heart. 


[132] 


HOME 


WINGS 

As  a  blue-necked  mallard  alighting  in  a  pool 
Among  marsh-marigolds  and  splashing  wet 
Green  leaves  and  yellow  blooms,  like  jewels  set 
In  bright  black  mud,  with  clear  drops  crystal-cool, 
Bringing  keen  savours  of  the  sea  and  stir 
Of  windy  spaces  where  wild  sunsets  flame 
To  that  dark  inland  dyke,  the  thought  of  her 
Into  my  brooding  stagnant  being  came. 

And  all  my  senses  quickened  into  life, 
Tingling  and  glittering,  and  the  salt  and  fire 
Sang  through  my  singing  blood  in  eager  strife 
Until  through  crystal  airs  we  seemed  to  be 
Soaring  together,  one  fleet-winged  desire 
Of  windy  sunsets  and  the  wandering  sea. 


[135] 


DREAM-COME-TRUE 

Dearest,  while  it  would  sometimes  seem 
As  if  I  really  had  the  art 
Of  putting  into  words  the  dream 
That  fills  another's  heart  — 

And  though  in  its  own  dream-come-true 
My  heart  sings  ever  like  a  bird's 
The  wonder  of  my  life  with  you 
I  cannot  put  in  words. 


[136] 


ONE-DAY-OLD 

Baby  asleep  on  my  arm 
Would  that  my  heart  could  enfold  you, 
Cherish  you,  shelter  you,  hold  you 
Ever  from  harm. 

Born  in  a  season  of  strife 

When  warring  with  fire  and  with  thunder 

Men  wantonly  shatter  asunder 

All  that  was  life  — 

Into  a  world  full  of  death 
You  come  with  a  gift  for  the  living 
Of  quiet  grey  eyes  and  a  giving 
Of  innocent  breath. 

Baby  asleep  on  my  arm 
Would  that  my  heart  could  enfold  you, 
Cherish  you,  shelter  you,  hold  you 
Ever  from  harm. 


[137] 


TO  AUDREY 

A  crocus  brimmed  with  morning  light 
Burning  clean  and  amber-clear, 
Single  on  the  wet  black  mould  — 

So  to  me  you  come,  who  hold 
Heaven  in  your  heart,  my  dear, 
Every  morning  out  of  night. 


[138] 


MICHAEL 

Why  should  he  wake  up  chuckling  ?     Only  hark ! 
Chuckle  on  chuckle,  lying  in  the  dark 
Alone  in  his  little  cot.     What  may  there  be 
That  we,  for  all  our  wisdom,  cannot  see 
Gazing  grave-eyed,  in  the  old  heart  of  night 
To  fill  his  baby  heart  with  such  delight  ? 


[139] 


SUNSETS 

When  the  world  fell  to  pieces,  and  we  stood 
Stripped  to  disaster,  in  the  surge  and  reel 
Of  crashing  nations,  still  too  numbed  to  feel, 
Too  stunned  to  think,  we  knew  one  thing  held  good 
Above  the  strife,  and  though  all  else  should  fail 
That  made  life  lovely  underneath  the  sun, 
Love,  that  from  the  beginning  made  us  one, 
Against  annihilation  should  prevail. 

And  when  on  the  shivering  edge  of  the  unknown 
Un  fathomed  darkness  each  must  stand  alone 
With  eyes  that  look  their  last  upon  the  light 
Regretful  and  bewildered,  we'll  not  shrink 
But,  still  undoubting,  over  the  last  brink 
Step  down  unfalteringly  into  the  night. 


[140] 


THE  STAIR 

Dear,  when  you  climbed  the  icy  Matterhorn, 
Or  braved  the  crouching  green-eyed  jungle-night 
With  heart  exultant  in  the  sheer  white  light 
Of  the  snow  peak,  or  cowering  forlorn 
In  the  old  Indian  darkness  terror-torn  — 
Had  you  no  inkling  on  that  crystal  height 
Or  in  that  shuddering  gloom,  how  on  a  flight 
Of  London  stairs  we'd  meet  one  Winter's  morn? 

And  when  we  met,  dear,  did  you  realise 
That  as  I  waited,  watching  you  descend, 
Glad  in  the  sunshine  of  your  eyes  and  hair, 
And  you  the  first  time  looked  into  my  eyes 
Your  wanderings  were  done,  and  on  that  stair 
I,  too,  O  love,  had  reached  the  journey's  end. 


[I4i] 


THE  EMPTY  COTTAGE 

Over  the  meadows  of  June 

The  plovers  are  crying 

All  night  under  the  moon 

That  silvers  with  ghostly  light 

The  thatch  of  the  little  old  cottage,  so  lonely  to-night. 

Lonely  and  empty  it  stands 

By  the  sign-post  that  stretches  white  hands 

Pointing  to  far-away  lands 

Where  alone  and  apart  we  are  lying. 

Lonely  and  empty  of  all  delight 

It  stands  in  the  blind  white  night : 

And  under  the  thatch  there  is  no  one  to  hark  to  the 

crying, 
To  the  restless  voices  of  plovers,  flying  and  crying 
Over  the  meadows  of  June, 
All  night  under  the  moon 
Crying  .  .  . 


[142] 


THE  CLIFFS 

In  the  warm  dusk  of  the  moonless  Summer  night, 
As  on  the  shingle  by  the  still,  dark  sea 
We  rest,  the  chalk-cliffs  beetle  eerily 
Over  us  glimmering  a  ghostly  white ; 
And  silence  steals  upon  us  as  we  lie 
Watching  a  far-off  intermittent  light 
Momently  flashing  cold  and  dazzling  bright 
Between  the  dark  tide  and  the  moonless  sky. 

We  watch  the  flashing  light  that  seems  to  flare 
An  instant  only  between  centuries 
Of  ominous  grey  midnight,  and  we  stare 
With  eager  peering  eyes  into  the  gloom, 
While  over  our  little  lives  in  shadow  loom 
Primeval  cold  still  ghostly  presences. 


[143] 


HOUSES 

The  house  we  built  with  hands 
To  shelter  love's  delight 
From  the  pitchy  night, 
Dark  and  empty  stands. 

But  from  our  house  of  dreams 
Everlasting  light 
Through  the  pitchy  night 
Pours  in  golden  streams. 


[144] 


WORCESTER  BEACON 

When  every  spur  of  whin's  a  spike  of  ice, 
Each  grassy  tussock  bristling  blades  of  steel. 
Each  withered  bracken-frond  a  rare  device 
Of  sparkling  crystal  crackling  under  heel 
With  brittle  tinkling,  then  it  is  the  time, 
O  love,  to  leave  the  chilly  hearth  and  climb 
The  sun-lit  Beacon,  where  the  live  airs  blow 
Along  the  clean  wave-edge  of  drifted  snow. 

Love,  let  us  go 

And  scale  the  ridge  :  I  long  to  see  you  there 

Breathing  the  eager  air 

With  cheeks  aglow, 

The  sunlight  on  your  hair : 

O  love,  I  long  to  share 

With  you  a  moment  the  white  ecstasy 

And  crystal  silence  of  eternity. 


[1451 


WORDS 

Could  I  without  weak  words  that  fret  and  grieve 
Fashion  of  singing  airs  and  living  light 
The  invisible  fabric  that  the  swallows  weave 
At  sunset  in  their  interlacing  flight, 
A  sheer  imperishable  ecstasy 
To  clothe  your  spirit  in  viewless  singing  fire, 
Then  should  I  labour  to  my  heart's  desire, 
Nor  fear  to  dim  your  spirit's  lucency. 

But  I  have  only  words,  words  born  in  stress 
And  travail,  for  your  spirit's  loveliness. 
Yet  may  not  my  dark  syllables  in  their  flight 
Through  other  minds  weave  out  of  song  and  light 
The  fabric  of  my  dream,  that  all  men  see 
Your  spirit's  beauty  through  eternity. 


[146] 


THE  SADDLE 

The  Saddle, —  where  that  August  noon  we  basked 
Above  the  gorse  in  the  quivering  golden  glow, — 
Was  a  smother  of  white  mist  and  driving  snow 
That  stinging,  blinding  and  bewildering,  tasked 
My  utmost  powers  as  in  the  wan  twilight 
I  crossed  the  ridge  this  afternoon  alone, 
Plunging    thigh-deep    through    drifts    of    whirling 

white 
In  a  wind  that  seemed  to  strip  me  to  the  bone. 

Yet  as  I  struggled  through  the  drifts  I  knew 
No  sharp  regret  for  golden  days  gone  by ; 
For  in  my  heart  was  the  blaze  and  scent  and  bloom 
Of  unforgotten  summers,  as  I  thought  of  you 
And  the  happy  babes  even  then  awaiting  me 
In  the  golden  hearthlight  of  our  little  room. 


[147] 


SONG 

I  long  to  shape  in  stone 
What  life  has  meant  to  me 
That  my  delight  be  known 
To  all  eternity. 

Though  in  love's  praise  I  give 
To  time  frail  words  alone, 
Yet  may  not  song  outlive 
All  perishable  stone. 


[148] 


QUIET 

Only  the  footprints  of  the  partridge  run 
Over  the  billowy  drifts  on  the  mountain-side; 
And  now  on  level  wings  the  brown  birds  glide, 
Following  the  snowy  curves,  and  in  the  sun 
Bright  birds  of  gold  above  the  stainless  white 
They  move,  and  as  the  pale  blue  shadows  move, 
With  them  my  heart  glides  on  in  golden  flight 
Over  the  hills  of  quiet  to  my  love. 

Storm-shaken,  racked  with  terror  through  the  long 
Tempestuous  night,  in  the  quiet  blue  of  morn 
Love  drinks  the  crystal  airs,  and  peace  newborn 
Within  his  troubled  heart,  on  wings  aglow 
Soars  into  rapture,  as  from  the  quiet  snow 
The  golden  birds;  and  out  of  silence,  song. 


[i49] 


SALVAGE 

Five  of  these  poems  have  been  rescued  from  a  dis- 
carded book,  issued  in  1905  :  the  sixth,  "  The  Salt- 
Marshes, "  though  written  in  191 2,  is  now  printed 
for  the  first  time. 


THE  LAMBING 

Softly  she  slept  in  the  night  —  her  newborn  bairn  at 

her  breast, 
A  wee  warm  crinkled  hand  to  the  dimpling  bosom 

pressed  — 
As  I  rose  from  her  side  to  go,  though  sore  was  my 

heart  to  stay, 
To  the  ease  of  the  labouring  ewes  that  else  might  die 

before  day. 

Banking  the  peats  on  the  hearth,  I  reached  from  the 

rafter-hook 
My  lanthorn,  and  kindled  the  wick ;  and  taking  my 

plaid  and  crook, 
I  lifted  the  latch  and  turned  once  more  to  see  if  she 

slept, 
And  looked  on  the  slumber  of  peace:  then  into  the 

night  I  stepped 

Into  the  swirling  dark  of  the  driving,  blinding  sleet, 
And  a  world  that  seemed  to  sway  and  slip  from  un- 
der my  feet 
As  if  rocked  in  the  wind  that  swept  the  roaring  star- 
less night 

[153] 


NEIGHBOURS 

Yet  fumed  and  fashed  in  vain  at  my  lanthorn's 
shielded  light. 

Clean-drenched  in  the  first  wild  gust,  I  battled  across 

the  garth 
And  passed  through  the  clashing  gate  —  the  warm 

peat-glow  of  the  hearth 
And  the  quiet  of  love  in  my  breast,  the  craven  voices 

to  quell 
As  I  set  my  teeth  to  the  wind,  and  turned  to  the  open 

fell. 

Over  the  tussocky  bent  I  strove  till  I  reached  the 
fold  — 

My  brow  like  ice  and  my  hands  so  numbed  they 
scarcely  could  hold 

My  crook  or  unloosen  the  pen :  but  I  heard  a  lamb's 
weak  cries 

As  the  gleam  of  my  lanthorn  lit  the  night  of  its  new- 
born eyes. 

Toiling  and  trembling  I  watched  each  young  life 

struggle  for  breath, 
Fighting  till  dawn  for  my  flock  with  the  oldest  of 

herdsmen,  death : 
And  glad  was  my  heart  when  at  last  the  stackyard 

again  I  crossed, 
And  thought  of  the  labour  well  over  with  never  a 

yeanling  lost. 

[154] 


NEIGHBOURS 

But  as  I  came  to  the  door  of  my  home,  drawing 

wearily  nigh, 
I  heard  with  a  boding  heart  a  feeble  whickering  cry 
Like  a  motherless  yeanling's  bleat :  and  I  stood  in  the 

dawn's  chill  light 
Afraid  of  I  knew  not  what,  sore  spent  with  the  toil 

of  the  night. 


Then  setting  a  quaking  hand  to  the  latch  I  opened 

the  door, 
And  shaking  the  cold   from  my  heart  I  stumbled 

across  the  floor 
To  the  bed  where  she  lay  so  quiet,  calm-bosomed,  in 

dreamless  rest 
And  the  wailing  baby  clutched  in  vain  at  the  lifeless 

breast. 


I  looked  on  the  still  white  face,  then  sank  with  a  cry 

by  the  bed 
And  knew  that  the  hand  of  death  had  stricken  my 

whole  joy  dead  — 
My  flock,  my  world  and  my  heart  with  my  love  at  a 

single  blow : 
And  I  cried  "  I,  too,  must  die!  "  and  it  seemed  that 

life  ebbed  low, 

[i55l 


NEIGHBOURS 

And  the  shadow  of  death  drew  nigh:  when  I  felt  the 

touch  on  my  cheek 
Of  a  little  warm  hand  out-thrust,  and  I  heard  that 

wail  so  weak : 
And  knowing  that  not  for  me  yet  was  there  ease 

from  love  or  strife, 
I  caught  the  bairn  to  my  breast  and  looked  in  the 

eyes  of  life. 


[156] 


THE  FIRE 

Brushwood  and  broom  I  bring  to  feed  my  fire, 
Brief-flaming  bracken,  brittle-flaring  ling, 
Quick-crackling  gorse  and  cones  that  smouldering 

sing 
With  sappy  hiss  as  blue  flames  jet  and  spire. 
Beech-mast  and  leaves  through  long  years  bedded 

deep, 
Pine-needles  stacked  about  rock-rooted  firs 
In  woodland  hollows  where  no  echo  stirs  — 
I  bring  to  feed  the  fire  that  shall  not  sleep. 
Fiercely  it  leaps,  exultant  in  the  night 
In  fresh-fed  fury  roaring  to  the  stars, 
While  gaunt  black  shadows  dance  among  the  scars 
Whose  craggy  spurs  are  tipped  with  golden  light. 
By  night  and  day  the  perishing  bright  flame 
Wind-flourished  flares  and  fails,  yet  never  dies, 
But  lives  that  I  therein  may  watch  your  eyes  — 
Those  fire-bright  eyes  my  love  could  never  tame 
Which  from  the  white  heat  of  the  burning  core 
Look  out  upon  me  as  I  gaze  and  gaze. 
I  bring  fresh  boughs  to  feed  the  hungry  blaze 
That  fire  may  burn  your  heart  for  evermore 
Wherever  in  far  southern  lands  you  roam, 

[157] 


NEIGHBOURS 

By  what  marshlight  of  wandering  passion  led : 

For  tumbled,  cold  and  empty  lies  my  bed, 

Deserted  bare  and  windswept  is  my  home. 

Without  foreboding  from  the  fold  I  turned 

To  come  to  you;  but  over  the  heather-thatch 

No  smoke  of  welcome  curled :  I  raised  the  latch 

No  fire  of  welcome  on  the  hearthstone  burned. 

I  called  your  name :  I  climbed  the  ladder-stair 

Up  to  the  roof-tree  chamber,  raftered  low : 

The  sunset  filled  it  with  a  golden  glow 

Of  mocking  light,  but  you  I  found  not  there. 

Long,  long  I  called  your  name  in  bield  and  byre 

And  fold  and  shieling,  over  hill  and  dale. 

Your  heart  heard  not.     With  hands  that  never  fail 

I  feed  and  feed  the  never-failing  fire. 

Wide-eyed,  not  ever  slumbering,  night  or  day, 

I  watch  the  flame  that  feeds  upon  my  life, 

That  trampling  shower  or  thunder's  crashing  strife 

Shall  never  quench  till  all  be  burned  away  — 

Till  when,  at  last,  consumed  and  spent  I  fall 

In  cold  grey  ash  of  passion's  fiery  gold, 

Wherever  you  be,  your  heart  shall  shudder  cold, 

Your  feet  shall  turn  to  answer  to  my  call. 


[158] 


THE  HAYMAKERS 

Last  night  as  in  my  bed  awake 
I  fretted  for  the  day 
I  heard  the  land  rail's  constant  crake 
Among  the  unmown  hay : 

And  in  my  head  the  thought  that  burned 
And  parched  my  lips  and  throat 
Was  like  a  wheel  of  fire  that  turned 
On  that  hot  aching  note. 

But  with  the  crowing  of  the  cock 
The  hours  of  waiting  passed, 
And  slowly  a  shrill-chiming  clock 
Struck  out  the  night  at  last. 

I  rose ;  and  soon  my  hot  eyes  roved 
Over  meadows  dewy-deep 
That  in  the  wind  of  morning  moved 
As  if  they  turned  from  sleep: 

And  where  the  crimson-rambler  wreathed 
The  casement  of  my  room 

[159] 


NEIGHBOURS 

On  my  hot  brow  the  cool  air  breathed 
As  on  each  fading  bloom. 

I  watched  the  martin  wheel  and  poise 

Above  his  nested  mate : 

When  clear  through  morning's  murmurous  noise 

I  heard  a  clicking  gate 

As  down  the  dipping  meadow-road 

He  bore  with  easy  pace 

His  shouldered  scythe,  and  brightly  glowed 

The  dawn-light  on  his  face. 

All  morn  with  singing  chorus  blithe 
Unwearied  through  cool  hours 
Was  heard  the  swishing  of  the  scythe 
Among  the  grass  and  flowers. 

All  morn  behind  the  swaying  row 
Of  shoulders  brown  and  bare 
I  followed,  glad  at  heart  to  know 
He  moved  before  me  there. 

And  as  I  laboured  with  the  rake 
Among  the  stricken  grass, 
Light-footed  in  the  mowers'  wake 
The  happy  hours  did  pass. 

[160] 


NEIGHBOURS 

Too  quick  they  went,  and  all  too  soon 
The  hour  of  resting  came 
When  over  the  withering  field  the  noon 
Hung  in  a  still  blue  flame, 

For  as  in  shadow  green  and  cool 
He  sank  down  wearily 
Beside  an  alder-shaded  pool 
He  never  turned  to  me ; 

And  though  afar  beneath  the  briar 
I  watched  him  where  he  lay, 
He  knew  not  that  my  eyes  afire 
Burned  brighter  than  the  day : 

And  yet  so  loudly  in  my  breast 
Beat  my  tormented  heart 
As  if  to  rouse  him  from  his  rest 
I  thought  to  see  him  start 

As  one  awaked  from  midnight  sleep 
By  knocking  in  the  dark. 
But  in  his  eyes  unclouded  deep 
There  gleamed  no  kindling  spark. 


To-night  no  rails  unresting  crake 
'Mid  fallen  grass  and  flowers: 

[161] 

/ 


NEIGHBOURS 

Naught  stirs,  and  yet  I  lie  awake 
And  count  the  crawling  hours  : 

And  as  I  watch  the  glimmering  light 
I  await  dawn  tremblingly, 
Lest  in  the  quiet  of  the  night 
His  heart  has  turned  to  me  — 

Lest  I  should  find  the  day  has  come, 
As  yet  the  day  shall  rise 
When  he  shall  stand  before  me  dumb, 
The  fire  within  his  eyes. 


[162] 


ROMAN'S  LEAP 

They  found  you  nigh  the  foot  of  Roman's  Leap 
Deep-buried  in  the  bracken's  rustling  gold  — 
Your  arm  beneath  you  bent,  your  brown  face  cold, 
Vet  all  unheeding  round  you  browsed  your  sheep. 

They  found  you  nigh  the  foot  of  Roman's  Leap : 
They  laid  you  on  a  hurdle,  bracken-strewn : 
They  bore  you  home  beneath  the  waning  moon 
With  laboured  breathing  up  the  craggy  steep. 

They  found  you  nigh  the  foot  of  Roman's  Leap : 
Their  whispering  shadows  darkened  in  the  door: 
Their  griding  hobnails  crossed  the  sanded  floor, 
And  in  with  them  the  whole  night  seemed  to  sweep. 

They  found  you  nigh  the  foot  of  Roman's  Leap : 
They  laid  you  out  upon  the  fourpost  bed, 
Two  candles  at  your  feet,  two  at  your  head, 
Salt  on  your  breast  your  soul  from  harm  to  keep. 

They  found  you  nigh  the  foot  of  Roman's  Leap : 
Deep  buried  in  the  bracken's  rustling  gold : 
Dumb  sorrow  in  my  heart  is  frozen  cold : 
Unloose  your  clutch,  O  death,  that  I  may  weep ' 

[163] 


THE  ARROW 

By  peat-black  waters  flecked  with  foam 
She  lay  beneath  the  flaming  West. 
I  plucked  the  arrow  from  her  breast, 
And  staunched  the  wound,  and  bore  her  home. 

Before  the  hearth's  red  glowing  peat 
I  laid  her  on  a  bracken-bed, 
And  loosed  the  dank  hair  round  her  head, 
And  chafed  her  snow-cold  hands  and  feet 

Until  the  living  colour  crept 
Through  her  slim  body  :  and  her  eyes 
Looked  into  mine  in  still  surprise 
Once  only  ere  she  softly  slept. 

Yet,  though  she  wakened  not  nor  stirred, 
I  gazed  in  those  still  eyes  all  night 


[164] 


NEIGHBOURS 

Within  the  peat-glow  till  the  light 

Of  daybreak  roused  some  restless  bird : 

When  in  the  dawning's  drowsy  grey 
With  watching  spent  I  fell  asleep, 
And  slumbered  till  the  bleat  of  sheep 
Awakened  me,  and  it  was  day. 

Cold  on  my  brow  I  felt  the  wind 
That  gently  flapped  the  unlatched  door, 
And  stirred  the  bracken  on  the  floor 
Whereon  I  looked  and  thought  to  find 

Beauty  yet  slumbering  in  the  gold 
Of  withered  fern :  but  no  dark  head 
Now  nestled  in  the  bracken-bed 
That  rustled  in  the  dawn-wind  cold : 

And  she  was  gone  I  knew  not  where : 
I  only  knew  that  I  must  go 
To  seek  her  ever  high  and  low 
By  hills  and  valleys  of  despair. 

So,  flinging  wide  the  flapping  door, 
I  turned  my  back  upon  my  home. 
By  peat-black  waters  flecked  with  foam, 
From  dawn  till  dark,  for  evermore 

[165] 


NEIGHBOURS 

By  moss  and  fell  I  keep  my  quest 
Grown  old  and  frail  with  failing  breath, 
Though  now  I  know  that  only  death 
May  pluck  the  arrow  from  my  breast. 


[166] 


THE  SALTMARSHES 

Over  the  fog-smothered  marshes  we  splashed  on  our 
way  to  the  quay 

Under  a  blind  yellow  moon  bemused  in  a  mizzle  of 
rain, 

When  low  through  the  yelping  of  gulls  and  the  muf- 
fled wash-wash  of  the  sea 

Suddenly  shuddered  a  voice  —  the  voice  of  a  crea- 
ture in  pain. 

Cold  at  my  heart,  I  stopped  dead  on  the  causeway, 
and  listening  hard, 

I  muttered,  and  half  to  myself,  "  It's  surely  a  hu- 
man moaning!  " 

But  still  stumping  steadily  on,  Pete  grumbled,  "  It's 
naught  but  the  groaning  — 

The  groaning  and  fash  of  a  young  cow  calving  in 
Angerton's  Yard." 

Yet  again,  as  we  steered  to  the  pots  through  the 
breathless  and  mist-moithered  night. 

Coldly  over  my  heart  that  shuddering,  smothering 
cry, 

Low  through  the  salty  fret  and  the  dazzle  of  driz- 
zly light 

[167] 


NEIGHBOURS 

Echoing  sobbed  and  moaned,  then  sank  to  a  shiver- 
ing sigh : 

And  tinder  my  breath  as  I  stooped  again  to  the  oars, 
rowing  hard, 

I  muttered  once  more  to  myself:  "It's  surely  a 
human  moaning!  " 

And  only  the  oars  in  the  rowlocks  creaked  in  an- 
swer:    "It's  naught  but  the  groaning  — 

The  groaning  and  fash  of  a  young  cow  calving  in 
Angerton's  Yard." 


Dead  they  found  her  next  day,  the  mothering  girl,  in 

the  dyke, 
Strayed  from  the  track  in  the  fog  and  foundered, 

sucked  down  in  the  gloam, 
For  lightness  of  heart  and  for  laughter  none  ever 

has  known  her  like : 
Heavy  and  quiet  she  lay,  grave-eyed,  as  they  carried 

her  home. 
And  the  trudge  of  the  bearers'  feet,  to  my  icy-cold 

heart,  beating  hard, 
As  it  still  muttered  over  and  over :     "  It's  surely  a 

human  moaning!  " 
Mocked  with  a  splashing  thud-thud,  as  in  answer: 

"  It's  naught  but  the  groaning  — 
The  groaning  and  fash  of  a  young  cow  calving  in 

Angerton's  Yard." 

[168] 


NEIGHBOURS 

And  ever  across  the  saltmarshes,  making  our  way  to 

the  quay 
By  moonlight  or  starlight  or  murk,  in  fog  or  fair 

weather  or  rain, 
Low  through  the  yelping  of  gulls  and  the  whisper  or 

crash  of  the  sea, 
Suddenly  shudders  a  voice  —  the  voice  of  a  creature 

in  pain : 
And  vainly  I  cover  my  ears  with  my  hands  as  my 

heart  listens  hard, 
Muttering  and  mumbling  too  late :     "  It's  surely  a 

human  moaning!  " 
Bitterly  mocking   itself   in  answer:     "It's   naught 

but  the  groaning  — 
The  groaning  and  fash  of  a  young  cow  calving  in 

Angerton's  Yard." 


PRINTED    IN    THE    UNITED    STATES    OF    AMEEIOA 


[I69] 


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